


Lingering Scars

by elynross, Taselby



Series: Cause & Consequence [4]
Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-29
Updated: 2010-01-29
Packaged: 2017-10-06 19:35:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 43,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/57058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elynross/pseuds/elynross, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taselby/pseuds/Taselby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nine months after reuniting in Paris, unspoken fears and unresolved issues are threatening to drive them apart. Can Duncan and Methos overcome their own misgivings and injured pride long enough to work things out? Sequel to The Causes Remain and Twilight Kingdoms.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

****Special thanks to our beta readers, Rachael Sabotini, Luminosity, Killa, and Merry Lynne. Sometimes a swift kick in the pants is all it takes.

This story is a direct sequel to The Causes Remain and Twilight Kingdoms.  


 

* * *

_"Etiam sanato vulnere cicatrix manet."  
\-- Roman Proverb_

Even when the wound has healed, the scar remains.

* * *

Paris, France  
June 17, 2003

Methos' sword glimmered in the darkness, describing elegant, deceptively slow-seeming arcs that grabbed at the minimal light, casting lacy patterns in the air. The sword seemed weightless, the inertia of its motion guiding him effortlessly from one position to the next, sometimes striking his opponent's blade with a chime and a spark. Sometimes the invisible razor edge connected with clothing, or other soft things, and he was rewarded with a grunt or low gasp of pain. His anger grew as the fight continued, smoldering beneath his outward display of calm and absolute control. He was ready to be done with this farce.

The paving stones were slippery under his feet as his sword guided him around his opponent, a large shadow in the night bearing his own pale wand of death. The eyes...the eyes would tell him, but they were hard to see in the dark. Even the body, strong and agile, was muffled by layers of clothing to ward off the damp chill. Only his Presence remained unaltered, roaring like the ocean in the back of Methos' mind, silently crying 'Immortal.'

//There!!// He pressed his advance on the other man, forcing him backward over the slick stones. Eventually the man hesitated, either tiring or unsure of his footing, and Methos struck. The other man's slender sword skittered away in the darkness, and Methos pressed close, hooking the toe of one boot behind his ankle, sending him sprawling on the wet ground. The broadsword hovered lightly just under his ear.

"Yield!" Methos snarled, breathing hard.

A chuckle echoed off the walls. "All right," MacLeod panted, "you win. What's the forfeit? Gonna make me do the dishes for another month?"

Methos shook his head as he lowered his sword slowly. "The next time I get to beg off." He extended a hand to help Mac rise, pulling him up into a brief, passionate kiss. "You're lucky you can trust me, MacLeod. Are you all right?"

"Well, my sweater's seen better days, but yeah." There was a pause as he dusted ineffectually at his clothing. "Come on, let's find the katana."

"No thanks to you if it didn't end up in the river. Can't afford to be sloppy, Mac."

Mac shrugged and bent to retrieve his sword, closer to the water than made Methos comfortable. "We both know that if this had been a real fight--"

"Do we?" Methos shot an exasperated look at him. "Every fight is a real fight, Mac. Every one, you know that. Always fight to win." He tilted his head up into the mist, vapor wreathing his face as he spoke. "Let's get back inside before it really gets miserable out here."

The rain started again halfway back to the barge, an unseasonably cold drizzle that crept under coats and sweaters until there was no place on Methos' body that was warm or dry. He slapped his boots a little harder along the gangplank than was strictly necessary, trying to pound some blood back into his frozen toes. His sword clattered against the wall as he hung up his coat, and he flung himself down on the couch, again with gestures marginally bigger than the activity warranted, his discontent on display. He ignored his damp clothes for a moment, feeling the scratchy creak of damp wool on his skin and gleaning a small satisfaction from Mac's twinge of dismay as soaked boots thudded down on the wooden surface of the coffee table.

He continued picking at the spar like a scab. "You got careless, Mac. If I'd been--"

"But you weren't." Mac flashed a small smile that was probably supposed to be reassuring and continued puttering at the bar, pouring tumblers of whisky. The sharp, smoky scent of the liquor drifted across the room.

"It's not like you to take a spar so lightly." Methos' voice was tight with tension, a frustrated, directionless anxiety that had been building in him and refused to dissipate, no matter how he tried to let go of it. He knew Mac had noticed, that the spar had been an attempt to get him to loosen up, but apparently it had just given him a focus for his irritation. He clamped down further on his churning emotions, trying to bury the anger that simmered too close to the surface, threatening to erupt, not wanting to make Mac suffer for his moodiness. The light clink of the glasses as they jostled together scraped across his nerves like sandpaper. He caught the troubled look Mac gave him.

"It was supposed to be relaxing, Methos. What's the matter, anyway? You seem--"

Methos cut him off. "Nothing's the matter, Mac. I'm just...I'm just tired, and you were careless." He tried to soften his tone.

"You know, it wouldn't be so hard if you didn't insist on sparring in the middle of the night like this." Duncan stepped over the booted feet like they weren't leaving pools of water all over the delicate surface of his table and sat at the opposite end of the sofa, handing off the other glass of scotch he carried.

Methos breathed, reaching for calm, trying to fill himself with the rich, warm, peaty scent of the single-malt and the stale tang of cold smoke from the morning's fire. "Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me. You're insane, doing katas on the deck in the middle of the day. Trust me, some day there's going to be a headhunter just out of range with his binoculars and a notebook, jotting down the finer points of your style."

Mac smiled more genuinely this time. "You make it sound like I should just sell tickets, or give public demonstrations. If someone is really out to get me, there are easier ways to do it than that."

"You think I don't know that? That's what bothers me. Sometimes I think you have a death-wish." He hunched forward over his drink, dropping his head when Mac started rubbing his shoulders.

"I'm glad you care." Mac's tone was amused as he stroked Methos' neck, curling his fingers around to stroke his check.

"Yeah, well I'd like to go on having someone to care about, thank you very much." He rubbed his cheek into Mac's hand, nipping lightly on his fingers. "You drive me insane." He went along as Mac pulled his head up, leaning into that warm, generous mouth. "Mmmm...Scotch tastes good on you."

Mac smiled. "Thanks."

Methos looked at him, watching his pupils dilate, feeling Mac's thumb stroking over his cheek, along his lips. His chest was tight with a mixture of need and panic. He kissed Mac's thumb, then set his glass down on the table before standing. "I'm going to take a shower." He hoped that it was clear from his tone of voice that he needed a little time to himself.

Under the stinging spray, he let the warmth seep into his muscles and bones, but it didn't displace his anxiety. MacLeod was up to something, and for all the Highlander's attempts at subtlety, he might as well have pinned a note to his chest announcing "I've got a secret." Methos didn't yet know what the secret might be, but whatever it was, Mac had been gently preparing him for it all evening. It made him all the more nervous because it was so unlike Mac, who was normally so direct.

He'd known he was in real trouble when he got back to the barge and found Mac busily preparing a dinner of Narsirk and brussels sprouts, saffron rice, and wine several times more expensive than they usually drank. Persian beef was a far cry from their usual dinners of pasta or take-out. Mac seemed to take the old adage 'the way to a man's heart is through his stomach' as seriously as any woman Methos had ever known, but it was the candles that had seriously put him on edge. Mac was a romantic, and a sensualist at heart, but he did not light dinner candles for any but special occasions. After clawing through his mental fil-o-fax and discarding any other possible occasion that he might have forgotten (including Queen Elizabeth's birthday, Father's Day, and the anniversary of his and Mac's first kiss computed on a lunar calendar), Methos rightfully concluded that Mac was up to something. He wasn't looking forward to finding out what was being served up for dessert, feeling far too much like he was being positioned over a mark on the floor clearly labeled 'stand here,' just waiting to have something unfortunate dropped on him.

* * *

Disquieted, Duncan listened to the muted hiss of the shower and sipped at his Scotch, swirling the fiery liquid absently as he watched the light play over the turbulent surface. This wasn't going to be easy. In fact, nothing seemed to be easy anymore. He'd hoped that Methos' voluntary return nine months ago indicated that the other man wanted something more, that he was willing to work at a relationship. Certainly there had been no more than a token resistance when Duncan had wanted to continue the interrupted physical closeness they'd begun that night in Seacouver, and what had started as a reaching out to each other physically had seemed to grow by leaps and bounds. It had felt so easy, so right, having Methos with him, satisfying so many needs in his life. Companionship, comfort, friendship, sex...it was all of that and more.

At Duncan's urging Methos had stayed on, fitting himself effortlessly into Duncan's life, Duncan's spaces, slowly bringing his things to the barge and lingering on as a kind of continuous guest. The offer to make the arrangement more permanent had always been there, unspoken, but Methos had never taken advantage of it.

And for months it had gone well, after Ehren's death, the two of them moving around each other easily, happily sharing the upkeep of the home, trading evenings at rock concerts and the opera, the theatre and the latest action movie. There had been many long, intimate talks, a lot of laughter, plans for trips to be made and things to be done. Methos had shown him a capacity for tenderness and laughter that he'd only suspected before.

But now...now it all seemed to be falling apart, unraveling as fast as Duncan could try to piece it back together. The spar tonight had been at Duncan's urging, after Methos had commented that they needed to get more exercise than the horizontal kind. The fact was that something was wrong, the quiet happiness they'd enjoyed was slipping away from them, and Duncan was at a loss to know what to do about it.

Methos had seemed so happy at first, but lately nothing seemed to please him. He knew that Methos cared about him, showed it often in his own inimitable, sarcastic way, but something was bothering him, and he didn't seem to be able to talk about it. Duncan had learned enough about dealing with Methos to know that sometimes it had nothing to do with him, and he just had to let Methos work it out in his own time.

He stood up and moved to build up the fire, taking out his frustration on the logs as he poked and stirred the embers back to life. The fire snapped and popped, fresh tongues of flame licking up the sides of the new wood he'd added. He sucked a deep breath of the dry, fragrant heat and reached for the calm he'd kept himself carefully wrapped in all night. Giving in to his emotions would get him nowhere, quickly. All he wanted was for Methos to open up a little bit, let him in -- not hold back so much. He'd learned a lot about Methos in the last few years: Kronos, Seireadan, Ehren. The bits and pieces kept adding up, fitting together into a not quite comfortable, incomplete picture that left him feeling as if Methos was almost more of a stranger than he'd been before. He knew that wasn't true, that he was finally getting to know Methos himself, as opposed to the various aspects that were trotted out to play, but he wanted so much to know more, to be able to understand -- and faster. He sighed. He'd forgotten exactly how much work went into a new relationship.

Methos the student, the storekeeper, the friend, the warrior, the lover...he seemed to slip from one to the other with little effort, but without giving Duncan much sign as to where he fit in with them. And lately he wondered if Methos was realizing this, as well. He took a deep breath at the momentary panic that set in at the thought of Methos leaving and went to pour himself another drink. He knew that if Methos decided to leave there wasn't much he could do about it, but he hoped that it wouldn't come to that, that Methos would give them time to be comfortable with each other. Unfortunately, it was almost as if the more settled things appeared, the more agitated Methos' response.

Methos wasn't gone long. Duncan watched him emerge from the bathroom in a cloud of scented steam to dig out clean jeans and a sweater, admiring the lines of his body, feeling his belly heat with the desire that was never far away. No matter how tense things got, so far the sex was always great. Hell, sometimes it was better for the conflict, their desire seeming to feed off the dark emotions and leashed passions that were never really very far away. He pushed that thought aside, not wanting to complicate the night any further by introducing sex into the mix. Getting up, he poured them each another drink, moving to hand one to the other man.

"Thanks." Methos' acknowledgment was polite, but cursory, though the accompanying smile seemed genuine enough. He moved back to the couch, staring into the fire. The hot shower and warm, dry clothes seemed to have mellowed him a bit, but it was like bailing out a leaky lifeboat with a teaspoon, never enough to make a real difference. Duncan didn't know what was eating at him this time, or any of the other times, but he was getting more than a little tired of it. Before, he'd simply bided his time and let the situation resolve itself, let Methos work out whatever was troubling him on his own. And thus far it had been a successful tactic. Truthfully, since Methos seemed more than a little reluctant to talk about anything even approaching personal, it was the only option left to him -- but this time it wasn't working.

Firmly pushing down another brief surge of frustration, Duncan tossed back his drink. He took a deep breath before speaking again. "Joe called."

Methos glanced up briefly before returning his gaze to the fire. "Yeah? What'd he want?"

Duncan grinned at the distrustful tone. "Maybe he just wanted to see how we were doing."

Methos snorted. "Not bloody likely. When's he coming back to Paris?" Duncan hesitated too long, and Methos turned to look at him suspiciously. "What?"

"There's this Blues Festival." Duncan looked up, but the flatly distrusting hazel eyes offered no encouragement. "In Nevada."

The level stare never wavered. "That's nice. What's it got to do with us?"

"Well..."

"No." Methos' tone was adamant.

"I haven't even asked you yet."

"It doesn't matter. I'm not going." Methos got up to refill his glass.

"Why not?"

"In case it's slipped your memory, there are people in the States looking for me, Mac. You remember them, right? Shabby sport coats, badges, guns...oh, yeah, and that unholy determination to see me behind bars? I'm better off in Paris."

"Methos, it's not like anyone is going to know you! It's a blues festival. You know, big crowds, loud music, lots of beer?" He tried to keep his voice even. What came out was not quite wheedling, not quite impatient, but was apparently close enough to both to set Methos off. Even in the dim light he could see the firm set of the square shoulders and the dark, angry flush spreading up the smooth neck. "It's just a short trip. We'd be there and back so quick nobody would even notice."

"Mac, what part of 'I'm not going' isn't getting through to you?" Methos' voice deepened, darkening in a way that sent a shiver up Duncan's spine. Methos sucked a deep breath and shook himself, turning back from pouring his drink -- a double. "If you want to go, go! Drink, dance, have fun. I'm sure I can entertain myself until you get back."

"But I want you to come with me, Methos." Duncan moved in behind him, fitting his body gently against the slender man. He paused for a heartbeat to savor the heat and scent of him before leaning over to breathe in Methos' ear. "I've gotten used to having you around."

Methos tensed as if the words pushed at him. "You said yourself it won't be for long. I'll be here when you get back." He turned in the circle of Duncan's arms to look at him, seeming to see the doubt on his face. "I'm not going anywhere." Methos reached up to touch his cheek. "I won't leave while you're gone."

Duncan wasn't sure which of them Methos was trying to convince, and he felt the panic flaring in his gut again. He lightly replied, "Well, that's the problem, isn't it? I want you to go someplace. Nevada, to be exact. With me."

"Well, we don't always get what we want." Methos pulled away, draining his glass.

Duncan took a deep breath and swallowed his hesitation. In for a penny... "Joe wants us both to come, Methos. He specifically asked."

"Cheap shot, MacLeod. And cheap labor. You'd think he could find less expensive roadies than flying them in from Paris. Besides, I thought he was your Watcher? What's he doing in the States while you're still over here?"

"Well, I'm usually not over here this time of year, so he'd made arrangements." God, he'd known this wasn't going to be easy, but Methos seemed determined to make it as difficult as possible. He felt the beginnings of a headache creeping up the sides of his skull.

* * *

Mac kept his tone careful and even, but Methos heard the unspoken reproach as clear as a shout. //See, Mac? I'm complicating your life. A creature of patterns and a creature of randomness should never try and set up house together.// He couldn't seem to keep himself from pushing at Mac, responding too sharply.

Moving to the porthole, he felt the chill wash over him as he left the fire's heat behind. Methos stared out at the lights across the river, cold and distant, for all their brilliant glow. The embers snapped in the background. Methos hated the new style of sodium-orange street lamps; they always made it look to him as though the city was on fire. He smiled grimly. They had given him nightmares at first, full of smoke and screams, men and horses dying, cities in flames...

Nine months now, since Ehren's death. Nine months that he and Mac had each been trying to adjust to the other's quirks and kinks, and Methos wasn't sure it was working -- for either of them. He felt as if Mac was watching his every move, certain he was going to take off the minute Mac's back was turned, and the sensation was more than a bit smothering.

More than that, Methos was feeling...he wasn't sure what he was feeling. Restless. It wasn't that he wanted to leave, but part of him wondered why he'd ever come back, whether it wouldn't have been simpler in the long run to just keep going. He'd left Seacouver knowing that it was for the best, that he and Mac would never be able to get past all the complications and misunderstandings. And then one day he just found himself landing in Paris with this incredible sense of anticipation and uncertainty.

He hadn't expected Mac to want him, not really, but he had -- more fool him. He wasn't exactly getting a bargain, in Methos' opinion, and he'd almost decided it would be better for both of them for him to just fade away again. Instead, he'd grabbed at the possibility, ignoring the dangerous sense of happiness that had flooded him when he realized how good it felt to just let go and take the chance. Methos had accepted the odd, troubled relationship he was offered, at first hesitantly, but then with greater joy and commitment to making it work.

And they had worked at it, making one adjustment after another, being open to each other's interests, each trying to accommodate the other's needs. But lately Methos felt like things were a little unbalanced, with him living on the barge, adapting to Mac's social agenda, his routine. At the same time, he admitted that he hadn't brought it up, that a part of him was entirely too comfortable just settling into Mac's life. Was it possible for too much comfort to make a person uncomfortable?

Up till now, Mac hadn't brought up the possibility of going back to the States, though Methos had been expecting it. When left to his own devices, Mac would be in Seacouver at this point. He sighed, leaning against the wall. Sometimes he felt like a captive moon, orbiting Planet Duncan MacLeod. Mac seemed to have settled quite comfortably into a pattern, but Methos wasn't sure where he fit in the larger picture. He wasn't sure he was ready to be that...dependent. To risk so much.

At the same time, he felt as if Mac was holding _him_ at arm's length, as if he wasn't really ready to deal with Methos, the five-thousand-year-old man -- which made it that much harder to open up. He'd tried to be patient, playing the game carefully, waiting for signs that Mac wanted to know more, was ready to see more, to move on, but nothing seemed to have changed. He seemed content with the face Methos had adopted. And whose fault was that? It was an easy enough mask to maintain. And it scared him more than a little that he seemed to be hunting for a place to lay it down. So, they'd started out reaching for each other, and now they seemed to be just maintaining the status quo, each waiting for something from the other.

He stretched, trying to alleviate some of the stiffness in his shoulders that never quite seemed to go away, lately. The touch of warm broad palms made him start, hands that seemed to know exactly where to knead. He hadn't even noticed Mac moving up behind him. The easy familiarity of those hands, the fact that Mac knew just what to do, just how to touch him, made him uncomfortable tonight.

"Methos," Mac said softly, "You can use a different name, somebody nobody's looking for -- I'm sure you've got one set up someplace."

Methos forcibly kept himself from stiffening; he wasn't sure whether that was bitterness in Mac's voice, or a simple acknowledgment that Methos always had alternative plans.

"Think of it as a vacation, a time away."

Methos didn't speak, but the words sounded in his head. //From what, Mac? What do we need a vacation from?// He sighed and made himself relax back against Mac, the tension in his shoulders yielding to the sure strength of those hands even as the rest of him perched on the verge of surrender to the determined power of that will. He didn't know anymore why he even tried to resist. He always gave in. It frightened him how easy it was to give in, yet another concession in an endless series of concessions. Sometimes he wondered if it was that very ease that was making him hold back. It shouldn't be that simple.

But why not? Why had it been so simple to just change his pattern of life for Alexa and not for Duncan? It certainly wasn't a lack of caring. And Mac was right; it was very unlikely that a brief trip to Nevada would stir up any trouble from Seacouver. He also had to admit that the thought of letting Mac go without him, leaving him here alone to stew in his own anxiety, wasn't very appealing. Hell, he might even miss the man. He was surprised at his own sense of relief when he pulled away from Mac's grasp and began pulling items out of the wardrobe.

"What are you doing?"

Methos looked up, startled at the note of fear in Mac's voice. He smiled slightly. "I'm packing. That festival is in Nevada, yes?"

"Yes." Mac's voice held a thread of suspicion and a rope of uncertainty.

Methos nodded. "You get to pick up the bar tab." He was startled at the warmth of pleasure that flushed through his system at the look on Mac's face.

* * *

Boulder Cove,  
On Lake Tahoe  
Aug. 14, 2003  
(3:18 am)

_Methos wove a drunkard's path through the swarm of people, his feet heavy and unfeeling on the tile floor, motion purposeful only in terms of away. There were people everywhere, pressing, crushing against him, pulling on his clothing, shouting, the din of voices like the roar of the sea, primal and unchanging. No language, no real message to be communicated, only the steady, deafening sound of the surf...a sea of bodies crashing against him._

_Panic swelled. There were too many of them, too many eyes to see his exposed secrets. Away. Blood and water flowed off of him, the raw meat of his wounded shoulder there for the world to see, his coat shredded with jagged rents, his face pale from cold and fright and loss of blood._

_Methos didn't want to die._

_And death was coming. His personal reaper came in a swirl of pale coat tails, as wet and bloody as Methos himself, carried through the sea on the confident, determined stride of long legs. Walking on water._

_Seireadan was coming to kill him._

_Methos' arm pulsed twin agonies, sharp and dull, every bump and jostle screaming white fire in his body. Blood dripped steadily from his fingers. It was getting hard to breathe, the world darkening, focus narrowing to the person ahead of him and the reaper behind him. He was so tired, so afraid, his hands empty. The air tasted like copper and steel, roses and chocolate. Another breath and a push through the crowd... He didn't want to die, not with so much undone, so many things unsaid. Not with the memory of Duncan's body so fresh on his skin._

_His stumbling feet found stairs, and they carried him up, toward the roof and back into the storm..._

* * *

Methos came awake on the image of a glittering sword arcing through the air. He gasped for breath, surprised when his lungs took in air without effort and his limbs moved freely. He scrubbed at his burning eyes with shaky hands, casting his gaze around the dark room to orient himself. A quiet grumble from beside him stilled his movement, and he turned to look at his sleeping lover, bent to breathe in the scent of him, the salty, astringent smell of sex that still lingered. He ghosted gentle fingertips in a feather-light touch over Mac's hair, grounding himself in familiar things, tangible things.

They'd returned late from the party where they'd met Joe, the extended jam session having stirred them both to the point that even making it inside the rented cabin had been a chancy thing. Casual touches begun on the drive back had taken on a life of their own, the slow burn building until the men had fallen on each other in a desperate frenzy of need and desire. There had been no time taken for teasing play, no gentle extending of arousal. It had been hard and sweet, mouths and hands urgent and hungry, leaving them both relaxed and drowsy.

Now, sleep had fled. Methos rose and padded across the thick carpet with the grainy-eyed weariness of the sleepless, rather than the lush, heavy-limbed somnolence that would pull him back to the bed and down into dreams. Ironic that Seireadan should start haunting his dreams again only now that the bastard had been dead for over a year and a half. Moving carefully, so as not to wake MacLeod, Methos pulled on a robe and moved to stand looking out over the lake. He breathed deeply, silently, still raw inside and craving open spaces around him, as if the crowds from his dream still pressed against his skin.

He stood quietly, balanced forward on his feet as though poised for flight, clearing his mind, letting go of the last remnants of the dream, trying to fill himself with the stillness of the water, deep and black in the moonlight. Seireadan was dead, and the dead had no power that the living didn't give them. It was over. But the last moment of the dream still haunted him, the moment of catching the sword Mac threw him, the solid impact against his hand. He could still feel the flash of panic that had accompanied it, something that had not happened in reality.

The water was so perfectly calm it looked as if he could run across the flawless surface of it. How much things changed, how much they remained the same. Methos would never forget the first time he'd seen this lake, the brilliant sapphire gleam dulled and clouded with mud and silt, the rich forests stripped away from the steep slopes of the Sierras. Tahoe had been a wasteland, its timeless beauty sacrificed to the immediate greed of the Comstock miners in Virginia City. So much wealth, so much devastation.

Maybe it was good that Mac had brought him here. Maybe they could make some new memories together in this place. Maybe...

* * *

_Virginia City, Nevada  
February 22, 1873_

_"You don't have to do this, Jack." Elinore wrapped her arms more tightly around his neck, pressing her face into his shoulder as he nudged open the bright yellow door of the small wood-frame house._

_"Of course I do. It's tradition. Besides, if I don't carry you over the threshold, you might stumble and offend the household gods. The...oof...Romans were very serious about that."_

_"That's blasphemy."_

_"Not to the Romans." Methos navigated them safely through the door and into the parlor on sure feet, at last setting his tiny bride on the sofa. "You stay right there and let me get the fire built up."_

_"At least let me help. Do you have a tea kettle?"_

_"In the kitchen. The tea is in the cabinet." He stacked the slender logs in the stove one at a time, encouraging the small fire to grow and watching Elinore carefully explore the kitchen. He sighed and dusted his hands against his trousers. She was so nervous. Even from here he could see her hands shake as she measured tea into the ceramic pot, spilling some of the water as she poured._

_She carried the pot with tremendous care, as if it were a rare treasure and not a cheap, painted trinket from the mercantile._

_"Elinore..." he began gently, laying a light hand on her shoulder._

_The pot fairly leapt from her hands as she jumped and turned, ceramic and water exploding over the wooden floor in a shower of painted shards, the bright floral design shattered beyond recognition._

_"Oh, Heavens, Jack!" Elinore dropped to her knees in the water and tea leaves, picking at the mess with her soft fingers before Methos could stop her, her pale face streaked with tears, bright spots of blood falling from her fingertips to stain her dress. "I broke it. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."_

_He knelt on the wet floor beside her and reached for her, at first shocked when she flinched from his touch. Pulling his hand back, he turned his attention to picking up the sharp slivers of broken pottery and did his best to project nothing but patient reassurance, reminding himself that this would take time. Methos smiled gently at her. "It's only a teapot. It's all right. Everything will be all right. I promise."_

* * *

Mac murmured and shifted in his sleep, pulling Methos back to the present. The stars were slowly winking out of the sky, and he could smell the sunrise approaching. He looked over his shoulder and saw Mac move, reaching out in his sleep to the empty place where Methos had been lying next to him. A deep wave of feeling swept through him, making him feel as though he were sinking inside himself, distinct emotions so tangled together that he didn't even know where to begin to unravel them. It wasn't fair that one man could awaken so many strong and utterly contradictory urges in him. Methos wanted to cling to Duncan like a life preserver, to flee as fast and far as his legs would take him, to shelter him and guard him against anything that might harm him, to wrap himself in the Highlander's protection like a blanket. Go, stay, resist, surrender, hurt, comfort, love...fear. He wanted, he wanted.

He'd not only allowed Mac to drag him back to the States, but to convince him that he'd actually enjoy himself -- and so far, he had. Miracles never ceased. Maybe Mac was right; maybe this was exactly what they'd needed.

Methos waited in the softening darkness, utterly motionless, even breathing shallowly until Mac had settled back to sleep, drifting back down into the fathomless deep of dreams. Then, with one last regretful glance for the comfort of the bed and the rest again denied him, he put on a pot of coffee and went to take a shower.

* * *

Strong hands stroked Duncan's back and shoulders, slowly, irresistibly pulling him up out of sleep, out of the grip of some pleasant dream. It slid away, falling down like a bright trinket into deep water, lost. There was a pang of regret for the lost vision as wakefulness insinuated itself along with the warmth of familiar hands and the clinging embrace of soft sheets. He sighed. "Mmm... What time is it?"

"Early." Humor and affection colored the rich voice, but no trace of sleepiness.

Duncan lifted his head from the pillow, squinting at the windows, mole-like. "It's not even light yet." He dropped back down with a muffled thump.

"You said you wanted to see the sunrise over the lake."

Duncan groaned, burrowing deeper into his pillow. Of all the times for Methos to hold him to a casual wish. The man had a very wide streak of cruel perversity in him. "I said a lot of things last night..."

"So I shouldn't believe anything you said?" Methos' voice was playful, but it carried an edge of threat. Something thunked solidly against the bedside table, and a dark, wonderful smell found Duncan's nose. The ambush was complete.

He sat up, stifling a yawn and rubbing at sticky, dry eyes. He arched an eyebrow suspiciously at the cup. A bleary squint at Methos. "That better not be decaf."

The picture of slighted innocence. Methos must practice that expression more religiously than the sword. "Would I do that to you?"

"You might." Duncan reached for the cup like a life preserver, clutching the warm ceramic in both hands. "And I meant most of what I said, just not the bit about seeing the sunrise. Today," he amended, sipping at the coffee. "You do recall the insane hour we got back?" He sensed the minimal nod, more than saw it, in the dark.

"Yeah. Blues players are an insane bunch. Joe was definitely in his element. I don't know when I've seen him so happy. And that trombone player...Dave? I think he could probably out-drink me if he was really trying."

"Methos, he outweighs you by at least a hundred pounds."

An indelicate snort. "One-fifty."

"Whatever," Duncan sucked at the coffee, not caring that it burned his tongue. Only then did he fully open his eyes, allowing them to adjust to the early morning gloom. Methos perched on the edge of the bed, already showered and dressed in the light colors and cool fabrics the Nevada summer demanded. He looked absurdly alert. "Did you even sleep?"

"Not much, but it's okay. I had some things to catch up on."

Duncan shook his head, smiling. "Vacation, Methos. This is a vacation. You know -- sleep late, spend money, eat things that are bad for you...play?"

"Hey! I may not have invented play, but I was around while it was still under copyright. I can play. Besides, you know what you just described is my preferred lifestyle." There was a pause. "Sometimes I just can't sleep."

"Dreams again?" He set the coffee aside, concerned. He knew about Methos' dreams, although Methos was reluctant to discuss the details of them. Still, Duncan knew how often they'd driven him from their bed at night. Like the rest of their difficulties of late, the dreams had been getting more frequent and more intense. He'd hoped they'd left the dreams, along with everything else, behind in Paris.

He recalled one night when Methos had woken him, crying out in a language that Duncan had never heard, pleading, tears streaming down his cheeks. Unable to witness that pain and do nothing, Duncan had woken him. Methos had dried his cheeks with a look akin to horror and fled the bed, refusing to talk about it. Duncan had been hurt, but he hadn't pressed him, hoping that Methos would be more comfortable in time. Duncan had noticed that Methos seemed much more at ease sharing factual details, bits of his history, than emotional ones.

Methos shrugged. "Nothing important."

"Methos... you can tell me." There was a single breathless pause, and he thought for that timeless moment that Methos would open up and tell him. He wished Methos would tell him. Nothing in the dreams could be as terrible as the scenarios that Duncan imagined.

Then Methos looked away, suddenly evasive, and the moment was over. He got up, moving restlessly, covering the motion by looking out the window. Duncan could see the sudden tension in the line of his shoulders. "There's nothing to tell, Mac. Really."

"If you say so." Duncan was unconvinced, but he let it go. Methos needed his secrets, and as much as Duncan wished he'd open up a bit more, he didn't want to risk pushing him away. And he didn't want anything to spoil their trip. He glanced at the clock. "You know, sunrise isn't until about 5:30 or so, and it's not like we have to go any further than the balcony..."

Methos feigned indifference, but there was a slight quirking of his lips. "So?"

Duncan smiled slowly. The anticipation game, the negotiation, was part of the fun. "So why don't you come over here and give me a proper 'good morning' kiss?"

"Oh, no. You'll wrinkle me." Methos grinned.

"Since when are you such a clothes-horse? Besides, that's my shirt."

Methos preened. "But it looks better on me." There was a thoughtful pause, all pretense of pouting gone. One knee was placed on the foot of the bed. "Come here," he commanded.

"What?" Duncan raised one eyebrow. He wasn't resistant, just curious; the tone was one Methos rarely used in bed: arrogant, playful, demanding. He was a pale pillar in the faint, silvery light. Tall, bigger than Duncan remembered him being, confident. Methos was always bigger than Duncan remembered. He made such a show of being "just a guy," of being unimposing, that even knowing the truth, it was hard to shake the impression of him as smaller, shy, less than he in fact was. It made Duncan uncomfortable each time he realized he'd let himself forget again.

"You want your 'proper kiss,' you come and get it." The tone was predatory.

Every inch of Duncan's skin tingled in anticipation. Methos seldom imposed his own desires on their lovemaking, seemingly content to follow where Duncan led them. He was always an enthusiastic participant, but willing to let Duncan shape their activity. The idea that he might take a more assertive role was exciting, even as it was unsettling.

"I'm waiting."

"All right." Duncan pushed aside the light blanket and crawled slowly across the bed.

"Ooh, feeling obedient today? I think I like you on your knees." The tone remained dark and deep, that tone that always thrilled and frightened Duncan, if only a little. He had no real fear of Methos, but every so often he was reminded of how young he was in comparison, of who Methos had been, and it always sent a little frisson of something like...fear, anticipated danger, up his spine. He looked up, pausing, suddenly intimidated. Methos placed his hands on his hips in an arrogant posture, surveying the bed, and Duncan, like the lord of the manor. There was a momentary shiver at the cool regard in those eyes, that look that said _please me_ and expected no less. Then it was gone, and this was just a game again, the quiet humor in the hazel eyes revealed by the growing light from the windows. Duncan relaxed into the game, eager to play.

"So, what about that kiss?" Duncan was close enough to smell him now, soap and deodorant and warm body-scents teasing his nose. The bright tingle of his anticipation had crossed the line into budding arousal. Games were fine, more than fine, especially now that he knew they were playing by the same rules.

"We'll get to it. Unbutton my shirt." Methos leaned back a bit, pulling the shirt tight across his chest, inviting contact.

"Your shirt?" Laughter threatened, even as he nuzzled his way up the sleek torso, lipping at the buttons.

"I'm wearing it, aren't I? Careful...no wrinkles. I'll be very displeased if you wrinkle me."

"Of course, Master. Will you punish me terribly?" Duncan valiantly fought the urge to grin as he reached for the small buttons. Even more notable was the restraint he showed in not simply biting off the little white fastenings. After all, he'd only promised no wrinkles. In the end, though, impatience won out over playfulness, and he slipped the smooth fastenings through the fabric in a more traditional manner. One, two, three...the smooth expanse of chest slowly revealed was scarcely darker than the ivory shirt.

"You have no idea..." Methos' breathing caught as Duncan lightly stroked the exposed skin with his lips. Four, five, six... "I didn't say you could kiss me yet..."

Duncan carefully turned the crisp linen back, wary of creasing it, his tongue tracing faint, moist lines across Methos' chest. Gradually he worked his way over to one nipple and set in to stake a serious claim there in ever-narrowing circles, savoring the taste of the warm, clean skin. "Hmm?"

"Nothing..." Methos groaned, his fingers brushing lightly, rhythmically against Duncan's head, cupping and holding gently, tracing over his ears and throat in a way that made Duncan burn inside. In anyone else, Duncan might have called the behavior shy, but this man, even now struggling to control his breathing, stroking softly at the back of Duncan's head, was anything but shy.

Methos pressed his chest against the teasing mouth, deepening the contact. Duncan had noticed early on that Methos was always so controlled, so deliberate, though no less passionate for that. Lately he'd begun to wonder what it might take to break that control, to bring Methos to the point of expressing his desire more forcefully, and the thought gave him that same frisson of anticipated danger.

"May I take your pants off now?" Duncan smiled around the tiny nub he was teasing and moved his fingers to roll its opposite with firm pressure.

Methos jerked and gasped, rasping out a response in short words. "Shoes first. God..."

"Of course...no wrinkles." Obedience, and this strange formality Methos had instigated, might have benefits after all.

"No...wrinkles..." The hands danced lightly over Duncan's back and shoulders, petting at his jaw, gently encouraging. _More_.

He bit the sensitive nipple, scraping it with his teeth.

Methos cried out and jerked back from those teeth. Abandoning the game, he didn't wait for Duncan to finish undressing him. Kicking off his shoes and slacks, he pushed Duncan back on the bed, a gleam of something hungry and desperate in his eyes, something that both stirred and alarmed Duncan, that sense of danger stronger. What had began as play, a teasing game, quickly deepened into something with its own energy and powerful momentum as they wrestled and pinched, touched and nipped with growing ardor and abandon. Duncan savored the hunger that he sensed in Methos' movements and unaccustomed forcefulness, even as he felt an underlying anxiety. Be careful what you wish for...Duncan abandoned the old homily and stretched himself recklessly beneath his lover's ravaging mouth and hands. More, he silently urged, as he was bitten, pinched, and kneaded almost to the point of pain. Almost.

Hands and mouths wandered freely, tickling and soothing, licking and nipping, finding a hip _there_ to slap, a tender place _here_ to caress, an erection _there_ to squeeze and stroke...

Yes...there.

Harder. Down. Slower. Yes. Bite...

_God_.

More.

Please...

_Yes_...

Soon enough there was no room for thought at all as he was stroked and petted, encouraged and aroused. Methos' touch was fire, burning away his reason, his ability to offer caresses in turn, everything, it seemed, but his voice, groaning out in response. So slowly, so gently, so completely was his body wakened, his excitement raised, that he barely noticed as Methos moved between his knees with that same caution. With that motion, the tenor of the moment changed again, slowing and deepening, unbearably intense, indescribably tender. The warmth over him vanished for an instant, returning with a lazy caress to his hip and the breathy glide of a smooth face over the soft skin of his belly and groin.

He groaned and pressed upward, and that hot, beloved, inhumanly skilled mouth opened to accept him.

Duncan felt like he was floating, anchored only by the smooth glide of the wet mouth over his cock. God, _nobody_ ever did this as good as Methos. Hot, wet, with that dangerous glide of teeth just so...

Then Methos was petting between his legs, cupping his balls, searching beneath them. One long, spit-slippery finger teased at his entrance, easing inside with firm, gentle pressure. Duncan tightened slightly in reaction, and the rhythm faltered for an instant. This was familiar, the tense pleasure of a finger pressing inside him, although it was still something shockingly intimate, leaving him feeling uncomfortably open, exposed in a way he hadn't felt with other lovers, even under similar circumstances. Methos didn't speak, pausing in his attentions to stroke his face against Duncan's hips, catlike, reassuring. The single finger continued to move in tiny increments, twisting slowly, pleasantly.

After an impossibly long moment, Methos' mouth resumed its seductive pleasuring, and as Duncan began to relax, Methos slid his finger in further, pushing to the side to make room for a second. The movement was smooth, casual, as if this was something they always did, this...intimacy. It was as far as they had ever gone before, Duncan's silent hesitation and unspoken anxiety preventing his relaxation or enjoyment. Each time he thought that this time he would be able to go further. It was nothing he hadn't felt before, but....And each time Methos quickly relented, their pleasure seemingly unmarred.

Surprise, anticipation, fear, and pleasure all combined with a faint burning sensation as the tight muscle reluctantly yielded to the penetration. Neither of them moved, apart from the gentle motion of Methos' fingers deep with Duncan's body and his mouth stroking against Duncan's shaft. The room was silent save for Duncan's gasps and groans of pleasure

Even the low burning as the muscle stretched wasn't unpleasant. Quite the opposite. The slight pain was satisfying in a dark, dangerous way, like having his neck bitten too hard. Easy, it should be so easy to just...let go, relax, and let it happen. To let Methos have him, have all of him. To let him in.

The fingers moved again, so slow, so tight and slick...so good.

Too good.

//I want this,// he repeated to himself over and over, a private mantra. And he did want it, almost as much as he feared it, this devastating intimacy. Even now there was a terrible urge to speak the words, to beg for the consummation, to throw himself on the sword. To embrace the devastation, the pain, the seductive pleasure of giving himself, the unmaking. He didn't know what held him back from finding this with this man, when it wasn't something entirely unknown. But it had never felt quite like this before.

Methos would unmake him, and part of him yearned for that, to be completely vulnerable, shattered and remade anew... It felt so good. Pain, pleasure...Duncan breathed, struggling to relax further, to be calm, to give himself to the feeling, but suddenly there was only dark anticipation and fear eating away at him with dull teeth. It was too much, too intense, too close. Methos looked up at him, gentle, questioning, and moved his fingers more deeply. The pleasure surged again, threatening to sweep him under. To overwhelm him.

//I can do this,// he reminded himself once more.

His eyes slid closed in acceptance and anticipation, even as his heart hammered, the rush of adrenalin and blood making his head light. The warmth covering him vanished as Methos raised up, and cold air poured over him, leaving him feeling defenseless and alone. Abandoned to the passionate hunger of those burning fingers, Duncan flinched from the sensation, and pain burned through him as he pulled off of the fingers, too fast.

He hissed and jerked away in shock, feeling exposed and vulnerable. Methos didn't pursue him as he moved away. Duncan pulled him up to kiss his neck, trying to apologize yet again for his clumsiness, his inability to let go. If there was another question in the bright hazel eyes, Duncan chose to misunderstand it.

In moments the lean body of his lover was turned and prepared, Duncan moving against him and inside him in the pale light, this pleasure that neither of them resisted. Methos moved with him, rocking slowly, accepting the give and take, the advance and retreat of Duncan's body silently, with none of the soft exclamations of pleasure that had escaped him before. Duncan gripped Methos' hand, stroking his body, his belly, and straining cock with coaxing motions until at last Methos yielded, eerily silent even in his release.

* * *

"Is something wrong?" Duncan already knew that there was, but he didn't know how to bring it up, didn't know how to explain something he didn't really understand himself. He wanted to be closer to Methos, wanted to give him whatever he asked for, but something held him back, some inner hesitation.

Not waiting for him to retrieve a warm cloth to clean them both, Methos rolled to the side of the bed with what might have been a carefully swallowed sigh.

"No, Mac, nothing's wrong." The carefully measured tone and the tension thrumming through his body made that a lie. Duncan suppressed the flare of anger, knowing that the lack of communication was mutual.

Duncan reached out to touch his shoulder. "Methos, I--"

Methos kissed his fingers lightly and stood up, gathering his clothes.

The silence was as deep and treacherous as an underwater cave. The right words were impossible to find, and the wrong ones... How could he describe a feeling that he wasn't even sure of? He felt the heat rising to his face as he struggled for composure, grasping for the words to say the right thing. "Methos, I'm sorry if--" He swallowed hard. "I can't--"

Methos cut off his awkward struggle with a slight shake of his head. "It's all right, Mac."

Duncan stared at the sheets, the floor, the walls, anything but his lover. He couldn't look at Methos right now, didn't want to see the carefully neutral expression he knew was forming on the familiar face. He didn't want to see the masks, the shields descending. He didn't know why this was so hard for him to accept. The enveloping quiet was like a deep well, steep and difficult to climb, with no place to find purchase.

There was hiss of running water and a low rustle of fabric as Methos washed and dressed. Duncan looked up at last to see Methos running his fingers through his hair, every shield carefully in place, looking as crisp and cool as he had when Duncan awoke.

Methos swept silently past him, picking up a mug of coffee that was surely cold by now from the dresser before stepping out onto the balcony overlooking the water. Duncan watched him cradle the mug and stare at the water, utterly motionless in the faint breeze.

Unable to stay in bed and do nothing, after a moment he pulled on a robe and followed him out, unconsciously mimicking his posture against the railing. The early morning air was sweet and cool, the scent of evergreens and the damp, fishy tang of lake water almost tangible on his skin. A water bird cried in the distance. Methos sipped at his cup.

"Isn't that cold?"

Methos shrugged and glanced down at the mug. "Even cold coffee is still coffee."

Not knowing what to say to that, Duncan looked back down at the water and the smooth, pale boulders jumbled along the shore. He made another foray into conversation. "I've always liked the rocks here."

An amused smile was his reward. Methos sipped at his coffee again and said, "It's a landslide scar."

"Really? How do you know?" Perfect. For all Duncan could tell, his and Methos' relationship might very well be in ruins, and here they were, casually discussing geology in the afterglow.

"If you look at the mountain, you can tell," Methos turned and gestured over the cabin's roof to the near slope. "Once you've seen enough of them, the signs are easy to read. The scars hang around for a long time."

"Oh." He shivered then, the sudden chill owing nothing to the cool breeze from the lake. Duncan wondered when Methos had first seen this lake, and if he had been here for the slide that gave Boulder Cove its name. He'd never mentioned that he'd been in this area before at all.

Methos looked at him and sighed, his eyes too old for the youthful face, seeing too much. "Listen, I want to go do some things in town. I'll see you later at the concert." The tone was as carefully neutral as the expression.

Duncan felt his face heat at the cool regard, ashamed. He didn't bother pointing out that nothing was open yet but supermarkets and casinos, or that there really wasn't any business to conduct on a vacation, or asking if Methos wanted some company. He hadn't been invited. The water lapped softly against the rocks, shimmering in the golden light. "We missed the sunrise."

Methos paused at the door. "It will be there tomorrow."

"Let's hope so."

Only after Methos was gone did Duncan realize that he had never gotten that kiss.

He went back inside and fell back on the bed, cursing himself for a coward and a fool. One of the few times Methos had been assertive and playful in bed, and he'd ruined it. He should have waited, should have been more accepting. He'd told himself over and over that there was nothing Methos could offer, or ask, that he wouldn't try to give. Methos had done the same for him, repeatedly given him space, or comfort, or the physical connection that he craved with a partner.

Too late, he realized that he should have swallowed his own sense of discomfort and vague guilt and pressed a little harder, found out what was really bothering the other man. There had been too many moments like this lately, where Duncan had uncharacteristically played the coward, letting Methos get away with a false assurance that everything was fine. Methos was the best there was at ducking a subject and avoiding direct answers to uncomfortable questions, and Duncan had let him get away with it. But he had the distinct feeling that this time Methos had only wanted him to ask again, to really want to know, and he hadn't asked.

That frightening feeling of exposure and vulnerability, of inadequacy, washed through him again, and he resolutely pushed it down. Methos had told him over and over not to ask questions that he didn't truly want the answers to, but sometimes...

Sometimes the real trick was finding the right questions to ask -- not to mention the courage to hear the answers. Sighing, he rolled over and hugged the opposite pillow, breathing the comforting scent of skin and shampoo that Methos left behind. Faintly, on the breeze from the window, he could taste the lake and the cool, green smell of sun-warmed grass.

* * *

Virginia City, Nevada

Methos drifted down the old plank sidewalks, dodging through the camera-laden crowd. He'd found an all-night cafe and sat drinking coffee mindlessly, thinking back over the morning. It was such a stupid thing to be upset about. Mac's reaction wasn't unusual; Methos knew that it wasn't something Mac was always comfortable with. Hell, at first he thought that he'd just moved the wrong way, pressed too hard, that his reaction had been one of pain. Then, when Mac had kept on, moving him, taking him, not saying anything...it had felt so empty, as if Mac couldn't be bothered to let him know what was wrong. It was foolish, but Methos had never doubted his own capacity for foolishness. And when Mac had pulled away, Methos had flashed on Elinore, on her reluctance to be touched or held. Was Duncan pulling away from him?

He sat, sipping at his coffee, until the sightseers showed up, allowing him to wander unremarked in the press. The Delta Saloon and most of the rest of C Street had been completely rebuilt after the fire, but many of the buildings bore the same familiar names, and even the mid-morning throngs of tourists were reminiscent of earlier days when this tiny tourist-trap had been a thriving silver boomtown of 20,000, rivaling San Francisco. A coat of paint, a layer of asphalt on the road, a parking lot where the International Hotel used to stand, different merchants in the storefronts, but the storefronts themselves of a type he remembered. Virginia City was like a grand matron in rouge and finery, still trying to pretend she was eighteen. So different, but so very much the same. He almost expected to see Elinore walking toward him...

* * *

_Virginia City, Nevada  
August 11, 1875_

_The sturdy, yellow-painted door swung open on well-oiled hinges. Methos nudged it wider with one foot and twisted to the side, stepping over the threshold with a wooden box under one arm._

_"Where have you been?" Elinore's voice cut across the dusty air with a familiar note of fear and possession as she set aside her rolling pin and brushed her tiny hands on the worn blue apron she refused to give up. The small kitchen was covered in flour and stacked with canning jars and baskets of apricots._

_//God help me, she's cooking.// He took the scene in with an air of resignation, setting down the small box he carried. "I went to the mercantile and got you some material for the dress you wanted to make and a few other things. It was supposed to be a surprise."_

_"Jack, you shouldn't have! You know we can't afford it."_

_His boots creaked across the wooden floorboards as he came to stand behind her, turning her back toward the pastry she was rolling. He hugged her slight frame to his chest. "I've told you before not to worry about what we can afford. I've got a good wage and nothing else to spend it on. Besides," he said with a smile, "I like indulging you."_

_She toyed nervously with the dough, pulling away from his embrace. There was a fine layer of dust and chalk along her back and hair where he'd touched her. "Still..."_

_"No. Enough of that talk. What's for dinner?" Dessert was obvious enough. Apricot pie. Another apricot pie in an endless series of pies. Still, he knew he should be grateful. In another month it would be apple. Heaven only knew what she was planning to can. Apricot jam, apricot preserves, apricot butter, all to sit uneaten in the pantry beside the tomatoes and corn and pickles and 'chow-chow' and God-only-knew what else she had squirreled back for the winter. Siberia should have such winters as Elinore prepared for._

_"I'm making that stew you said you liked. Is that all right?"_

_"Yes, whatever you cook is fine. I've told you before." Truthfully, he hadn't actually said he liked the stew, only that it was better than the other stew, the one with turnips in it. Life in medieval Europe had left him more intimately acquainted with turnips than anyone ever should be, but he couldn't tell her that. Just like he would never again point out the shortcomings in her cooking. Some nights he was grateful that he couldn't actually die from bad food._

_"Did you get Mr. Monaghan's building finished yet?" She glanced up at him with solemn eyes, waiting to see if he would let her change the subject._

_Nodding, Methos reached past her and took half an apricot from a bowl. He popped it into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully on the sweet fruit. "We should be done with the walls tomorrow, then a week for the mortar to set and it will be ready for the roofers."_

_"It will snow soon."_

_"It's only August. The roofers will be done in plenty of time to beat the weather. They should be, anyway. Monaghan's throwing enough money at everyone. Got workers swarming over the site like ants. You'd think he was building the Taj Mahal."_

_"What's that?"_

_He looked at her, for an instant forgetting how very young and isolated she really was. "It's a building in India. Emperor Shah Jahan built it for his consort, Arjumand, in the early 1600s."_

_"Did she like it?"_

_"She never saw it. It's a mausoleum."_

_"Oh." She continued assembling the pie, humming softly._

_Methos ate another apricot._

_"Have you seen it, that building?"_

_The memory of the sun on the marble and the heavy, wet smell of the Jumna River rolled over him. "Yes."_

_Elinore stiffened slightly, spooning sugared fruit into the pastry with firm motions. "You sound like you miss it."_

_He sighed. Over two years and she was still afraid that he would leave her, following some male wanderlust over the horizon. "Sometimes. I'll take you there someday. How's the garden fence?"_

_"Still falling over. I braced it with a rock." She wiped a hand across her forehead, leaving a white stripe of flour behind. He was always struck by the image of how alike they looked at the end of the day, covered in the evidence of their work, wreathed in white dust._

_Methos smiled at her, beautiful and comical in her plain dress and shabby, beloved apron, covered in flour and sugar. Her fingers were orange from slicing carrots. Giving in to impulse, he pulled her back to him, guiding her face up for a kiss._

_She froze. He ignored her fear and continued kissing her gently, coaxingly. At last she responded, crushing her tightly-closed lips to his in a parody of passion. After a long moment he released her, stroking her hair soothingly. "Elinore...You know I'll never hurt you."_

_Dark eyes fixed on the floor, she nodded, one tear trailing down her face. She brushed it away, leaving another trail of flour. "If you--" She took a deep breath. "We can--"_

_He pulled her in and held her close, her head tucked into his shoulder "Shh... Stop that. I'll never force you, either, you know that." Inwardly he cursed himself for pushing her limits. He hadn't married her for love, but her earnest attempts to please him were endearing in their own way. Methos felt a very real affection for her, tough little survivor that she was, and he had known too many women in her situation not to understand. He'd been there himself more than once. Brutalized and broken, finding strength, survival, only in the ability to yield, to surrender to fate without shattering further._

_"You're my husband." Her voice was muffled against his shoulder, her body tense under his hands._

_"That doesn't make any difference."_

_"Yes, it does. Men have n-needs..." She still refused to look at him. Methos suddenly wanted to go find her dead husband and dig him out of the mine tunnel that had collapsed on him, just so he could kill him again. Him and every man she had ever lain under in the brothels._

_"Yes, men have needs. So do women. Right now this man needs to go fix the garden fence, and then he needs to eat dinner." He placed one last kiss on the top of her head before heading out the back door._

* * *

Methos sighed. Mac was definitely not another Elinore, broken and battered by her past. But he'd sensed from both of them that uncertainty, that fear that he was only here for the moment, that they could turn around and he'd be gone. Did he really seem that flighty? That prone to running away? How did one go about changing that impression, except by not leaving? And how long would it take Mac to decide that Methos wasn't going to take off on him?

A near collision brought him out of the past, and he realized that he was standing outside the old Delta, breathing the familiar scent of sawdust and sage, smoke and beer. The ring of slot machines was new, or at least different from the last time he'd been a regular customer here, and not entirely welcome. Blandly, he accepted a coupon from the door greeter and pushed a quarter into a video poker machine, unsurprised when a pair of eights and single ace didn't pay off. Aces and eights were a dead man's hand.

It hadn't changed enough to be completely alien to him, even with the addition of the slot machines, video games, and souvenir stands, and that was the worst of it. He would almost prefer it had been razed to the ground rather than stand here like this, a mockery of his past. The old "suicide" Faro table was on display against the back wall, alongside portraits of the Silver Kings and some of Virginia City's prominent citizens, including Mark Twain and that murdered prostitute, Julia Bulette. Methos never ceased to wonder at the world and how little things really changed over time. Scarce more than a century gone and all people remembered were wealthy men, writers, and whores. Not a word for the others who had lived and died here, the miners and masons, shopkeepers, and innkeepers, the brewers and wives who were the heart and soul of the place, the Chinese and Jews, and all the anonymous thousands who had come here hoping to find their fortunes.

He sighed and turned away from the display, pushing his way through the massed bodies. Rich white men and whores. Days like this, Methos really hated the world.

The sweet smell of pipe tobacco and thrum of Immortal presence pulled him to the bar like a lodestone. The hair on the back of his neck stood up at the too-familiar sight of the narrow shoulders and striped shirt, complete with a red garter on the left sleeve. After his memory of Elinore, he wasn't even surprised to see him.

"Jerry Thomas?"

The man turned, setting aside the beer mug and polishing cloth. He gazed at Methos for a long moment before his face cracked open with a huge grin, his eyes brightening behind the small wire-framed glasses he wore. A fine-boned hand was thrust across the bar. "Jack! It feels like a hundred years."

That grin had always been infectious. Before he knew it, Methos was smiling back, shaking that warm hand. "It's been a hundred years." Hopping on a barstool, he took in the sparkling rows of liquor bottles and glasses on display. "They still call you Professor?"

"Yeah," Jerry answered wistfully. "It seems you can come home again, after all. What are you drinking these days?" He reached for a clean beer mug before waiting for the reply.

"What, do I have 'beer drinker' tattooed on my forehead?"

"Has the choice of beverage changed?" Jerry asked dryly, already pouring from the taps.

"Well, no, but..."

The grin widened as he passed the foamy lager across. "So what are you complaining about? It's good to see you, Jack. How's Elinore?"

Methos' grin faded as memory swelled again, this time sharp and sad. "Elinore's dead, Jerry. They're all dead. It's been over a hundred years."

"Oh, yeah. Sorry, sometimes it's easy to forget, especially here." He indicated the bar and his old-fashioned clothing.

"Don't worry about it, happens to the best of us," he mumbled, unsure if he meant forgetting or dying. The easy cheer of the mood was broken, and a slow melancholy sifted into its place. Methos took a large drink of the beer, swallowing painfully past the lump in his throat.

"So, the house is gone too?"

"What? Yeah, lost it in the fire." The fire of 1875 still gave him nightmares. As long as he lived he'd never forget the stench, the scream of men and horses, or the sharp explosions as Elinore's jars of preserves burst in the pantry.

"Too bad. I miss Elinore, sometimes, and that turnip stew she used to make."

Somewhere behind him a slot machine rang and began spitting coins as a woman shrieked. "She killed you once with that stew."

Jerry laughed at that. "Yeah, but just the once. So, what have you been up to?"

Glad at the change of subject, Methos pushed away the memory. Sometimes it was good to have old friends who remembered the same things you did, but this was a path he'd just as soon not travel today. "This and that."

"No, Jack. What brings you here to darken my door? I'd be flattered if I thought you were just lonesome for my sterling company, but even back then you only came because Elinore chased you out..." There was a pregnant pause as the slight, dark-haired man looked at him. "I see."

Methos scowled, glancing over his shoulder at the hysterical woman, still bouncing and screaming. "See what?"

The air of smug certainty was almost visible in the air as Jerry picked up another glass to polish. What was it with bartenders and glassware? "Blonde, brunette, or redhead?"

Methos' heavy beer mug hit the wooden bar with a thud, sloshing suds over the lip of the glass. "What is it with bartenders? Are you all just frustrated priests and guidance counselors? Can't a man come in out of the weather to have a beer without being grilled about the state of his private life?"

"The weather is 82 and sunny. That's an odd thing to run from."

Nodding absently, Methos followed Jerry's gaze out the window. "Yeah. Beautiful, isn't it?" he said. "Everything a day should be."

"So why aren't you out enjoying it? Isn't it enough?"

Methos glanced back up. Both of them were aware that they weren't talking about the weather, but some things were easier to couch in metaphor. Again, he wondered how old Jerry had been when he died, certain that if he asked, Jerry would tell him. He sighed, smiling faintly. Sometimes the mystery was better. "I don't know. It's all anyone could ask for, but sometimes it feels like it still isn't enough."

"Is it the weather, or the wardrobe?" The blue eyes were too calm in that young face. Right now Jerry looked about seventeen with the old eyes of a professional therapist or palm-reader.

"What?"

He sighed, frustrated, and set down the wineglass and towel. "You always were a bright one. If it's sunny outside, why are you packing the emotional equivalent of storm gear?"

"Even a stormy day has its pleasures." He thought of Mac and an impulsive camping trip. The thunderstorm had come on them unexpectedly, trapping them in the lee of a rocky outcropping. They'd made love in the rain, and Mac had been picking pine needles out of his hair for two days.

"Yes, and it still marks the passing of time. Nobody wants to picnic in it, though." Jerry's voice pulled him back again to this odd discussion. "Jack," he said gently, "it's not raining today. Which one of you is looking for dark clouds that aren't there?"

Methos twisted his glass, staring at the pool of condensation on the dark wood. "That's tough to say."

"And that's not an answer." Again that odd, maddening combination of youth and wisdom. He stretched and put away the neglected wineglass, and like that, the tension of the moment was gone. "Well, the day isn't over yet. Might get better, might get worse. The trick is knowing where to be if the weather changes."

Methos stared at him as if he were a djinn come to grant a wish, or an exiled god in disguise. "Where are you from?"

Jerry picked up the towel as another spotless glass found its way into the delicate hands for polishing. Methos had never seen him with a sword. "Home is where the heart is."

The empty mug was passed back along with a bill. "Thanks."

"On the house. Good friends are hard to find." The money was returned, Jerry's expression accepting no argument.

* * *

Duncan jerked awake, his limbs splayed as if trying to catch himself from falling.

//God.// It took long minutes of staring at the room around him and the bright patterns the sunlight made on the walls for him to extract himself from sleep and the remnants of a disturbing, but already fading dream. //Tahoe, I'm in Tahoe...Methos' dreams must be catching.//

He hadn't meant to fall back asleep, intending to stay awake and wait for Methos in case he decided to return. Unfortunately, he'd decided to wait horizontally, and the late night and libidinous exercise had caught up with him.

In the cold light of day, he wondered who, precisely, he was trying to fool. Methos wasn't coming back this morning, maybe not ever. The Old Man had an unparalleled capacity to disappear. He ran like a river... No. Rivers all ran the same direction, constantly, predictably, faithfully to the sea. He sighed and ran a hand over his face. Well, except the rivers here in Nevada, all flowing inland. He wondered if Methos had ever lived here. The decadent, pig-headed, contrary nature of the place seemed to suit him. Nevada seemed to have no natives, just a never-ending tide of people on their way someplace else. Methos would fit right in.

And wasn't he in a delightful mood this morning? //Methos says he's going to town, and I have it all decided that he'll just keep going.// When had he developed this disturbing lack of faith in them, in their ability to work things out? He glanced at the clock on his way to the bathroom. It was late, after noon, and he felt like he hadn't slept at all. If he hadn't yet left his mark on Methos, the old Immortal's fingerprints were certainly etched all over Duncan MacLeod. Up late, sleep later, drinking too much. And where was hedonism's poster child?

"Argh!!" The growl of directionless frustration was ultimately unsatisfying. If he were in Seacouver, he'd go downstairs and work out, beating on the bag until his knuckles were sore. He craved action, violence. Briefly he entertained the idea of hitting the wall, just to see how big a hole he could make, how much of a complete asshole he could be in the course of one morning, but he knew that the rental agent would never forgive him. Not that he cared overmuch for her good opinion. //No, Duncan, let's be honest. Methos would see it, and you don't want to give him that satisfaction.//

Funny thing was, Methos probably wouldn't even comment on it, just look at Duncan and arch that damned eyebrow and hang a picture over the hole. If he was going to go to all the trouble to break his hand and violate an innocent wall in a pointless venting of frustration, he wanted more reaction than the off-center hanging of a five dollar print. And Methos would probably go for black velvet, just to be obnoxious

He missed Seacouver. And there was the crux of it. He wanted Methos with him, but in his world, his places. Paris was fine, but MacLeod had become accustomed to indulging his wanderlust in carefully structured ways. Sure, there was the occasional side trip to Scotland, or Japan, or Tahiti -- or Tahoe -- but the bulk of his time since Tessa's death had been divided neatly between Seacouver and Paris, regular as the tide.

That thought caught him up short. It hadn't always been that way, had it? How could a man of four hundred become so set in his ways in such a short time? What exactly was he holding on to, shuttling back and forth, from the States to the Continent? Tessa? Richie? The illusion of a normal life he'd had with them? Whatever it was, he wasn't sure he was quite ready to give it up. At least...would it make a difference? Was that part of what was getting to Methos? The routine? Duncan's routine? For all that Methos complained about hating to move, his life was as unstructured as the wind. Maybe he was getting tired of Duncan's life. Maybe Duncan's life was too limited.

He'd stayed in Paris quite a bit longer than usual, hoping that it would appease Methos' own wanderlust if they stayed where Methos had established a name and a life, but he'd stirred up some unexpected resentments in himself. But surely it was worth it? If only he could figure out what was going on in that rabid mind. Surely he'd be back.

Methos had been a fairly established, if not constant, presence in Duncan's life now for eight years, appearing periodically as Duncan shuttled back and forth between homes. At first it had been a surprise, then a comfort. His dependence on Methos had started well before they became intimate. By the time Methos became a more-or-less regular fixture in his life, Duncan had practically started to take him for granted. Methos had blithely adopted himself into Duncan's life and intimate circle, and seemed willing to call Duncan's homes his own when he visited. Until Seireadan had found him.

Suddenly, shockingly, everything had changed. Even as the crushing weight of the revealed truths strained their fragile friendship to the breaking point yet again, they had become lovers. It was less surprising than it should have been, that night of fear and desire, and the seven month 'morning after' that followed. Thinking about it, Duncan realized just how abandoned he'd felt, that Methos had let him get so close, only to disappear. Even so, when he showed up in Paris, Duncan had lured Methos back into his life, but the terms had changed. And now they seemed to be changing again, and Duncan found himself more and more certain that Methos wouldn't like the new conditions.

For eight years Methos had been where Duncan was, seeming to know when he was needed, appearing without warning on a doorstep, bringing beer and friendship and that particular wry wisdom that warmed Duncan like a fire on a rainy day. Eight years, until Duncan craved his company, and then his body, his warm presence, like air. And now Methos was balking. Maybe he was tired of Duncan, tired of his inadequacies. Maybe trying to change their friendship had been a huge mistake. Maybe Methos just couldn't figure out a way to say he was leaving.

Tired of dwelling on them himself, he climbed out of bed. He'd come to Nevada partly for Joe's sake, and he still owed him his time and attention. And maybe Methos would show up, after all. Sighing at the pathetic nature of his thoughts, he made his way into the shower, studiously not thinking as he shaved, staring at his too-familiar features blankly.

It was too warm already for a truly hot shower, and the inadequate, tepid flow from the water-saver nozzle did nothing to curb his restless unease. Water drooling over his head, MacLeod watched the suds slipping away down the drain, feeling adrift and more alone than he had in years.

* * *

Reno Blues Festival  
Rancho San Rafael Park  
Reno, Nevada

It reminded Methos of a medieval trading faire, although the music was better. Everywhere were bright tents and booths selling incense and cassette tapes, musical instruments, T-shirts, Native American and country-style crafts, ceramics, food, drink, candy, and other assorted trinkets. The variety was overwhelming, both to the eyes and the nose. //And the ears,// he added to himself as he maneuvered past a noisy booth selling modern grunge rock. Joe's set was scheduled for 4:00 on the second stage, which meant that the band would be setting up in about fifteen minutes. With a sound system already in place, there wouldn't be that much equipment to move, but Methos still wanted to find Joe and offer an extra pair of hands. Idle hands left him with far too much time to think. Something about having them occupied let him shut down that sometimes inconvenient process.

He paused in the center of the path and turned to get his bearings, feeling not unlike a tree in the center of a river as the crowd continued to flow around him. This place was built like a maze. Whoever'd drawn up the plans should be tested for astigmatism and dyslexia, and then summarily shot. The second stage should be somewhere over to the left...

"Oof!" Without warning something small and solid crashed into his side, and the world tilted crazily as he struggled for balance.

"Jesus Fucking Christ! You moron!" The foul-mouthed cannonball resolved itself into a diminutive, redheaded woman swinging a guitar case to punctuate her swearing.

"Vanessa?"

The steady stream of curses trickled off as she peered closely at him.

"Adam? Hey, good to see you here!" Vanessa flung her arms around him enthusiastically, whacking him in the back of the head with the heavy black case. "Joe was looking for you guys earlier over by the main stage."

"I thought you guys were playing on the second stage at 4:00." Typically, once she recognized him, she was all exuberance with no apology offered for the impact or the outburst. Vanessa lived only in the present. //She'd make a hell of an Immortal.// He winced at the thought.

"Oh, yeah. I'm headed there now." She grabbed his hand and set off at a pace far brisker than her short legs should have permitted, dragging him along in her wake.

"Vanessa? You said Joe was looking for me?"

"He sat in with Ralph and Eddie Parker earlier."

"Sorry I missed that," Methos said with genuine regret. "But what did he need me for?" Vanessa was a dear and sang like a horny angel, to quote Joe, but getting information out of her was like pulling teeth. Shark teeth. And despite her enthusiastic greeting, she hadn't seemed to take well to Methos, though she appeared to be very fond of Mac.

"Oh, he wants you to come help wag the gear." She smiled and pulled harder on his hand, carving a path for them both with firm swings of her guitar case.

 

* * *

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

****//I am far too old for this,// Methos told himself yet again as he stretched, leaning from side to side to ease the stiff muscles in his back. Immortality was really worthless when it came to the little things. Sure, coming back from the dead was a neat trick and a big hit at parties, but you still had to put up with all the little annoying shit: pulled muscles, insomnia, the occasional lunatic with a sword, bad haircuts, shaving, hangnails...

He smiled, picturing Joe's face at that last one. //Yeah, sure. What good is living forever if I still have to condition my cuticles?// Joe would kill him for that one, maybe permanently. He checked his watch and glanced again at the cluster of musicians hovering on the back corner of the stage, tuning with fierce concentration. The set should begin any minute now. He still wasn't sure whether he hoped that Mac would show up, or that he'd stay away. Either choice seemed fraught with difficulties he'd rather avoid. He wasn't quite ready to let go of his injured feelings of the morning.

As if on cue, the deep pull of Immortal presence swept through him, and he stiffened, searching the crowd for the source. It was probably Mac, but there was no sense in taking unnecessary risks. He wondered if Mac would ever learn that lesson.

There he was. Even with his ambivalence Methos was startled by the tiny pang of foreboding he felt at the man's approach, almost as if he wished it were another Immortal pacing toward him with that dark intensity. Typically, MacLeod walked like he owned everything in sight. Not arrogantly, no, just exuding that lordly air than made Methos so insane, both because it was so antithetical to Methos' own lifestyle, and because he found it so deadly appealing. The man drew attention like a corpse drew flies. It was tough to be invisible next to that. Impossible to be 'just a guy' when you kept company with Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod. Never mind being his lover, once that became general knowledge.

Although he had to admit, in contrast to Mr. 'I've got a blade with your name on it,' Methos could look pretty damn harmless in comparison. Unfortunately, that wouldn't carry too much weight with anyone seriously hunting. Mac would draw them in, whether he wanted to or not, and Methos would get tangled in the web trying to fly away. As if he could leave with Duncan in trouble. As if he could leave.

Just by virtue of association, Methos was back in the Game, playing for keeps.

Oh, he'd considered leaving, when his anxiety struck. Sometimes it appalled him how unthinkable it was when every instinct in him screamed for him to run as far and as fast as he could. But it seemed as if you had where Mac was, and you had everywhere else. Every time he'd thought about leaving, everywhere else just seemed a bit drearier than the Mac Universe. He felt like a junkie -- a Duncan junkie -- and like any addict, the thought of quitting cold turkey was worse than keeping up the habit.

It had been simpler before, when they were just friends, when Methos could tell himself that he came and went on his own terms. MacLeod was entertaining, diverting. It was just a game, and after all, he could stop seeing Mac anytime he wanted. //Yeah, right. 'I don't have a problem, I can quit anytime I want.'//

He had turned the corner long before that devastating night they'd fallen into bed. Methos wondered just when it was that he'd lost control of this relationship. Just when had he started thinking of himself in terms of MacLeod? MacLeod's lover. Was there no more left of him than that? Did Mac think of himself in terms of Methos? Would it make any difference if he did? His ruminations were interrupted by the voice of the source of his questions.

"I wasn't sure you'd be here." Mac stood beside him, staring at the stage, rigid, like he was braced for a blow. Fair enough.

"I could say the same." He said it as flat and tonelessly as he could manage, betraying none of the hurt he felt at Mac's words. It was a lie, of course. He'd known Mac would come to see Joe, if for no other reason. But Mac hadn't thought he'd be here. God, he really did think Methos would just disappear.

The hard line of Mac's body tightened almost imperceptibly. "I wouldn't miss it."

The silence between them was filled with the buzz of the crowd and the low throb of Vanessa's bass tuning.

"Mac..." Methos' voice trailed off uncertainly as he hunted for words to reassure Mac. "I'm not leaving. I told you that in Paris. I just needed--"

Mac looked at him, and Methos could see the relief in his eyes. "I just-- I'm sorry..."

"For what?" he asked, his air of indifference slipping a fraction. The last thing he wanted to hear was another blanket apology, no matter how sincere. He knew what Mac was talking about; he just wanted to be sure that Mac was as certain. Mac's tendency was to try and fix everything, find some way to take the blame, and Methos was afraid that he was too prone to letting him.

"This morning. Don't play coy with me." A fine edge of anger colored the words. God, he was easy to read, his emotional buttons laid out in all their day-glo splendor for Methos to see.

"This isn't the place for it, Mac." Avoidance wasn't the best path, but it was the easiest. He'd had a lot of practice taking the path of least resistance. He knew he wasn't being fair, but right this minute he'd rather have his toenails pulled out than surrender another piece of himself to Mac's keeping while he was feeling so vulnerable to start with. //Might as well just say here, Mac, have this lovely knife so you can carve out my heart with it.// He held himself still by sheer effort of will, staring at the stage, trembling with the need to run, to save himself. He didn't miss the irony; maybe Mac was smarter then he was.

"No, the cabin was the place for it, but you didn't want to discuss it then, either. We always seem to have the time or the place right, but never both." Mac followed his lead and stared at the stage as if he would burn a hole in it with his eyes.

All of the tension was back, the moment of relief gone as if it had never existed. Why did Mac pick now, of all times, to start pushing? He could feel the tension coming off the other man in waves. Except for the rigid similarity of their postures, they might not even be speaking to each other.

"Funny, how that works out." Indifference was a weapon, and Methos used it mercilessly. The best defense...at least leaves you alive at the end. More or less.

"Yeah, funny."

More people filled in around them as show time drew closer. The crowd gave an odd sense of privacy, a feeling of safety. Methos wasn't afraid of the confrontation that was coming, and stealing a quick glance beside him at the Highlander's dark face, he was sure it was coming, but he was very reluctant to face the consequences of it. Mac would push and press until Methos finally confessed what was bothering him, and then...

Then it would be over. No more waiting for the end. He glanced up at the perfect crystal dome of the sky. Deep, transparent blue, cloudless, so pure it looked like it would chime if you struck it with a fingernail. A beautiful, perfect day, and he was preparing for a tempest.

"Are you unhappy, being with me?"

It wasn't the question Methos had been expecting, and it cut into him so cleanly he didn't notice the pain at first. Then he wasn't sure whether he hurt more for himself, or for Mac. He turned his head and saw that Mac was looking at him, staring him straight in the face with that earnest brown gaze that made Methos want to roll over and offer the man anything he wanted. No terms of surrender, no attempt at defense. No quarter asked, none expected. He didn't have to give Mac the knife; he already had it. Anything more was merely Methos offering to sharpen it for him, to position it properly over his chest for the easiest cut.

"It's not about happiness, Mac." He swallowed hard, wishing he'd bought a bottle of water, wishing he could go get one now without looking like he was running again. Despite himself, he glanced down, unable to hold that gaze, another example of his not being able to hold out against Mac. "It's not that simple." Didn't he know nothing was ever that simple?

"Can you explain it to me? Are you bored?"

Methos shifted his weight uncomfortably back and forth on his legs, horribly aware that it looked like he was squirming. Again there was the powerful, growing urge to go, to flee, all of his internal voices insisting that it was the right and proper and sane thing to do. If he only ran and waited long enough, all of this would go away, and they could be happy together. //Listen to me. I sound like a Turtles song. Idiot. Might as well go buy him some candy and a ring. I could give him my letter jacket and ask him to the prom. It would do about as much good.//

"Mac, if I didn't want to be here, I would go." He tried to keep his voice light and sincere.

"That's what I'm afraid of." It was the low, rough sound of MacLeod's voice that surprised Methos. Apology was easy for Mac. He was always ready to accept the blame, the responsibility, when something went wrong. It didn't matter if it was really his fault, or not, he assumed the burden of it and the task of correcting it. It was his nature. Mac wanted to take care of those in his circle...his clan. But admitting a real fear was something else.

"What? My leaving?" He stared at Mac, not quite believing what he was hearing.

MacLeod shook his head. "Not that." He smiled ruefully as he caught himself in the lie. "Well, partly that, but mostly that you will just go, and I'll never know why. I'm afraid that one of these days you'll wake up and step off the face of the earth, and I'll never know what happened. What I did."

That hit too close to home. //Oh, Mac, it's not you, it's me. I don't know how to do this anymore -- if I ever did.// He looked away quickly, feeling too exposed, too transparent to those eyes. Mac knew, he _knew_ how close Methos was to leaving again, to fleeing the closeness that he alternately craved and feared, closer than Methos himself had known. The need for motion bled out of Methos, leaving him cold and drained, even in the bright sunlight. He felt as if he might cry from sheer exhaustion and frustration. Methos was grateful when the music started, and the conversation stopped.

* * *

After the set, Mac and Methos were put to work helping the band break down the equipment and move it backstage to wait for the next set. Joe looked at them oddly a couple of times as they moved the stands and coiled cords in silence, but made no comment when they made their excuses and wandered off into the maze of vendors.

Mac kept pace with Methos as they walked, winding slowly through the narrow lanes between the tents and tables. They made a pretense of shopping, but neither of them was really looking at the merchandise. Methos could almost sense the tension radiating off of them, almost feel the words so thinly held back. He was surprised that people weren't bouncing off the waves, steering clear of them. Neither of them spoke.

Once upon a time, the quiet surrounding them might have been companionable, comfortable, savored because they knew there was no need to fill it up with things that were already understood between them. And then they actually tried making a life together. A brief, ecstatic honeymoon and then the cracks started to show. Now Methos realized how little they had in common, how very different their perceptions of everything were. Had he been so blinded by how he felt that he'd failed to see this before?

What had he called it once, Mac's offer of...what was this? Companionship, togetherness, closeness? That seemed a poor choice of words today with the silence so palpable between them, and love was a word they had both shied away from speaking. Faerie favors, that's what it was. Blinded by the glamour, you didn't see the junk in your hand. Being with Mac was like wishing on the monkey's paw. Oh, he got what he wanted, but never in the expected way.

At last Methos stopped, trailing his hand through the cold water in a display swimming pool. The tanned, bikini-clad salesgirl looked up from her lounge chair, but didn't come over to pressure them.

"I've thought about getting one for the loft." Mac's voice was a little too rough to make the small talk convincing, but Methos took it in the spirit it was intended, accepting the peace offering.

"Little small for a pool, isn't it, Mac?" The water felt good on his wrists. He thought about flicking a drop at MacLeod, but decided against it, looking back down into the bright water. The truce was fragile enough. Was it only this morning Mac was teasing him about playing? When had he grown so uncertain about everything?

That got a genuine smile. "Not a pool, a spa. One of those little bathtub models they have now."

"Are you going back to Seacouver after this?" Indifference was a shield this time, instead of a sword.

"I'd thought I might. If you'll come with me."

"Mac..." Methos paused, expecting Mac to cut him off with some verbal protest or reasoned coaxing. The silence continued unbroken as he dried his hands on his pants. The air here tasted like chlorine. Vaguely he remembered that chlorine was a poison. "You know I can't go back there."

"Why, because of Seireadan?"

Methos felt himself tighten at the mention of the name. "Among other things, yes."

"The police." It wasn't a question. "It's been sixteen months. The investigation is shut down, and you were never charged. 'Questioning,' Methos. That's all they ever wanted you for. They ask you if you did it, you say no, and they have to let you go. It's not that big a deal."

"A tidy little homicide, sure. But they're not going to be so quick to let go of a ritualistic decapitation coupled with the demolition of a shopping mall!" Methos spoke the words quietly, trying not to attract attention. "Mac, there are innumerable places in the world that are not Seacouver. I'm sure some few of them even have modern amenities such as blues bars, bookstores, and Wal-Mart. And the police, in these other mythical, unexplored places, aren't looking for me." Methos winced when he realized how close he'd come to confirming Mac's fear that he was leaving.

One eyebrow quirked up, disbelieving. "So, that's it?"

Methos nodded slowly. "I'm nervous enough just being back in the States."

The dark eyes stared through him, leaving Methos feeling like an open book, his pages turning slowly in the wind. It wasn't a familiar feeling, nor a comfortable one. Mac's head tilted, suspicious. "This isn't about the police, is it?"

Frustrated, he turned away. Didn't the man know when to drop a subject? Whatever happened to all that 'live in the moment' Zen philosophy he supposedly absorbed in the East? Let Mac get his teeth into a topic and he was like a terrier with an old wool sock. "I believe I just said that it was."

"No, you let me say that it was. Is this about us? Is that why you won't come home with me?" The volume of the conversation was slowly creeping higher. People swirled around them, the air stinking of hot dogs and beer, sunscreen and cotton candy.

Home. For some reason the word caught Methos off-guard, lodging in his chest and making it ache. "Didn't we already discuss this? If I didn't want to be with you, I'd leave." How many times did he have to say it? Methos wanted to grab Mac and shake him, screaming in his face to let it go. No good could come from this. //It's not my home, Mac. I don't know if I even have a home, anymore. I don't even remember the last time I had one. But oh, I'd like to be part of yours...if you'd only really let me.//

There were too many people for comfort. Methos itched inside his skin, craving silence and solitude. Claustrophobia scrabbled at his slipping control with sharp claws. The anxiety from his dream resurfaced to nibble at his restraint, blending with the impact of the actual crowd to make him feel as if nothing was quite real. He had to get out of here. Stealing another glance at Mac, he decided that the odds of luring him someplace more private to finish this discussion were minimal at best. Another image of Mac gnawing at a sock rose unbidden in his mind.

"Going along for the ride isn't the same thing as wanting to be there." MacLeod wasn't even looking at him, the tone so flat and casual that he might have been discussing the weather, or trading recipes for pot roast, but it hit Methos like a blow.

He stopped so fast that he was jostled from behind by a large woman who glared at him as she herded her brood of children around him. Every affectionate, sock-filled image suddenly vanishing from his mind, Methos was cold all over, his limbs heavy with dread. "Is that what you think I'm doing? You think I don't really want to be with you, that I'm...I'm using you as some kind of combination bed warmer and meal ticket?" He felt as if he'd never be warm again -- and some small part of him acknowledged that his reaction stemmed in part from hearing such things from Mac, things too similar to what he had been feeling about himself, hanging around planet MacLeod.

"Methos, that's not what I--" MacLeod backpedaled.

Anger and disbelief rushed in to fill the frozen void. "Christ, you do, don't you? You think I follow you like some kind of lost puppy, and you're the Immortal SPCA! Like I've got nothing better to do with my time than be your satellite! I've got news for you, MacLeod. I had a life before you came along, and I'll have one after you're gone. You are not the extent of my existence."

Having forgotten to control his voice in the flurry of emotions, Methos saw that they were gathering an audience. He absently noted the curious, faintly disgusted looks on the faces as they tried to act like they weren't listening. "Great!" He spun on a heel and started off between two rows of tents.

A firm hand snapped out and grabbed his arm, pulling him back toward the center of the conflict and the unexpected audience. "Wait!"

"Let go of me," he snarled, every inch singing with the need to lash out, though he wasn't sure who he wanted to hurt.

"Will you wait a minute?"

Did Mac really think that he would stay purely because it was commanded? If the relationship, the friendship, wasn't dead already, it was certainly on life support. And now Mac wanted to stand here in the middle of this circus and dissect the corpse. How much was Methos really expected to give here?

"MacLeod, let go of me now, or I swear we really will give these people a show they'll never forget." He looked significantly at the dark fingers starkly outlined against the pale linen shirt. Reluctantly, Mac released his grip.

"Will you let me talk?" Mac wasn't pleading yet, but he wasn't far from it. Strangely, that just made Methos angrier.

"Oh, I think we've said about enough for one day. Give Joe my apologies."

"Don't walk away from me!"

Methos strode briskly off into the anonymous masses and didn't look back. He just wanted to be somewhere else, some when else. He couldn't deal with this. He laughed bitterly to himself. They sure were making new memories, all right. God, he hated Nevada. Why did people always want too much of him, so much more than he could safely give...

* * *

_Virginia City, Nevada  
September 18, 1875_

_"Good night, Elinore." Jerry caught her in a light embrace and kissed her on the cheek. "The stew was delicious, as always."_

_"Thank you, Jerry. Good night." Elinore moved back quickly and unconsciously smoothed her dress, blushing a rosy pink at the compliment._

_"Night, Jack. See you tomorrow?"_

_Methos shook his head, grinning wryly. "Probably not. Watching Sharon and his cronies cry crocodile tears over Ralston is getting a little old. Besides, there's work I need to do around here."_

_"More like crying over the Bank of California closing. I much doubt they batted an eye when Ralston washed up in San Francisco Bay." The small man shrugged eloquently. "Can't say I'll miss any of them much when they're gone."_

_"Nor will anyone, I imagine. I'll likely be by later in the week. Good night." Methos clasped the small, almost delicate hand firmly and watched Jerry stride off into the night, the song of his Immortality fading with distance._

_Elinore glanced up from clearing the table. There was something thoughtful in her eyes, but she didn't speak._

_He went to help her, stacking plates and cups in the sink._

_She smiled. "Stop that. It's woman's work."_

_"It doesn't hurt me. Save the scraps. Little Mary up the street just got a puppy."_

_Elinore stopped, looking down at the table. "She's about six now, isn't she?"_

_He set down the plates with a dull clink, cursing himself. "Elinore, I'm sorry. I--"_

_"It's not your fault, Jack. It was...a long time ago." She said it lightly, dismissively, but he could see the tension in her pale face and the sudden stiff determination in her movements as she cleaned up the remains of the meal._

_Abandoning the cluttered table, he stood behind her, tugging gently on her shoulders until she relented and leaned back on his chest. "Put that down."_

_For once, she yielded easily, dropping the bowl. It fell with a clatter, scattering the scraps across the wooden counter. Methos held her to him, rocking slowly, comforting her as if she were a child. Dimly, the memory came back to him. Elinore had told him everything after he had proposed marriage one night in the parlor of the D Street brothel: the husband that had beaten her, the infant daughter that had died, her own sense of unworthiness after surviving however she could -- because of how she survived._

_In the end, her melancholy strength had won him, and he'd convinced her to come with him to the little house near Chinatown as his wife. A business arrangement, he'd said. She could cook and clean for him, and he would provide a home and a name for her, and his promise that no one would ever hurt her again. It was a promise he'd intended to keep, not knowing he'd break it most often himself, simply because she was so beaten down._

_The night after the quiet ceremony at St. Paul's Episcopal Church he had made those promises again._

_"While you stay," she'd replied quietly._

_"No, while I live." He'd kept his own oaths as best he could, both the public ones in the church and the private ones to her, and did his best to soothe the broken spirit in her._

_They had never spoken of love._

_And that night, two years gone, had been the last time he'd ever seen her cry. Until now._

_Elinore turned and pressed herself into the width of his chest, her shoulders trembling as she silently cried. "I'm sorry..."_

_"Shh...It's all right." He guided them into the parlor and down onto the small sofa, pulling her slight body back against his chest, rocking her and wiping her face. He was careful not to press her limits, not to offer anything more than comfort as she sobbed, grieving a child eight years dead._

_It was half an hour or more before she quieted, lying still against him on the sofa. She accepted his embrace and even returned it, one small arm tucked behind his waist, the other slowly tracing the buttons on his shirt. Elinore looked up at him, her dark eyes red from crying, something serious and purposeful in her expression._

_One button was worked open._

_"Elinore...?" Even as he questioned her, Methos' body reacted to the prospect, his skin burning with the need to be touched. Oh, he wanted her._

_"I'm...I'm not a stranger to it, Jack. Please?" She took a deep breath and slipped another button free._

_It was suddenly very warm in the room, and his clothes were much too confining. It had been so long. Still... "Are you sure? I said I'd never force you."_

_"And you're not. Please?" Another button on his shirt was freed, and her other hand began toying shyly with the band of his trousers. "Don't you want to?"_

_"Yes..." He reached slowly for the buttons on her dress, watching her closely, but this time she didn't flinch or pull away. "Come on," he whispered, urging her to her feet. "Not here."_

_He led her to the bedroom, as slow and gentle with her as he could be, his hands trembling with excitement and the force of his restraint. Careful, careful... They kissed and touched, Methos giving her every chance to refuse him as he eased her back on the wide double bed. He coaxed and whispered, stroked and teased, trying to get her to relax, to ensure her pleasure before taking his own._

_It was odd and sweet. Elinore was well acquainted with the mechanics of the act, but obviously unused to either consideration from her partners, or their concern for her enjoyment. After long minutes of his attentions she gasped and pulled at him, urging him over her, wanting to complete the connection. In the end, he was unable to bring her with him over the edge of release, one night insufficient to overcome too many years of abuse. He sighed, kissing her tenderly, brushing the sweat-damp curls away from her face. He'd wanted it to be perfect for her sake. Oh, well. There would be time enough to show her, to teach her the sensual delights still waiting to be discovered._

_"Are you all right?" He breathed, still lying over her, careful not to let his weight crush her._

_"Is it always like that?" He sensed rather than saw her breathless smile in the dark._

_"No." He chuckled. "Sometimes it's better."_

_There was a long pause, and her breath caught in a short sob, the quiet, happy mood turning unexpectedly. "I'm so sorry..."_

_Concern swelled, and he hugged her to him, kissing and whispering soothingly. "No, that isn't what I meant, shh... There's nothing to be sorry for."_

_"I'm sorry I made you wait so long."_

_Again, he brushed away the tears. "Don't cry.You're worth the wait."_

* * *

He stalked along the sidewalks, the bittersweet memories filling him. God, he should have thought about this before agreeing to come to Reno with Mac. He hadn't thought of Elinore in years, hadn't thought of that helpless feeling, of how he'd alternated between walking on eggshells and treading on glass shards, being so careful not to hurt her and hurting himself in the process. It had been one of his less satisfying marriages, driven by his own protective impulses and a genuine desire to give Elinore a little security, if not happiness. In an odd way, he felt the same way about Mac, not wanting to hurt him, wanting to give him time, but knowing that his own reticence only hurt them both.

And with both of them there was that feeling that there was only so much they could be comfortable with. With Elinore, he'd never even considered sharing his secrets. She'd been too damaged, too fragile. More and more he realized that he'd hoped for more from Mac, wanted to give more, but maybe he wanted too much. Maybe, like Elinore, Mac wanted only things he couldn't give.

He wandered aimlessly through the casinos, picked at the buffets with no appetite. After it got dark he walked the streets, watching the people, seeing the miniature human dramas unfold. He watched the johns cruising the streets, watched the whores transact their business, all of it so simple, so unemotional -- so appealing. A nice, tidy business deal, both parties satisfied, nobody hurting, no claims on either side. When she spoke, he'd already almost decided.

"You look like you could use some company."

* * *

Boulder Cove, Nevada  
On Lake Tahoe

The door swung open silently, spilling pale moonlight across the carpeting, filling the room with the scent of the lake and the low throb of Immortal presence. Duncan watched Methos enter the cabin slowly and stop to let his eyes adjust to the silver-black contours of the room. He watched as Methos dropped his bag by the unused coat-tree with a soft thump and then sighed, falling heavily into a chair, bending to unlace his boots, seemingly unaware that he was being observed.

Duncan watched him, drinking in the sight of him, feeling like the Grinch with a heart grown three sizes. Until the moment he felt Methos coming towards the cabin, he really hadn't expected him to come back at all. Unfortunately, the bands on his heart didn't break; they just hurt like hell. He felt no relief; there was no sense that things would be okay this time. //You are not the extent of my existence.// The words made him ache.

He'd spent the late afternoon wandering aimlessly around the festival, drifting through town, trying to understand it all, trying to figure out what he could do to make it right, knowing that they had to talk. On a whim, he'd bought Methos a copy of "The Cartoon History of the Universe," then almost thrown it away when it occurred to him that he might never have the opportunity to give it to him. Methos hadn't said he was leaving, but...Duncan had hurried back to the cabin at that point, hoping that maybe Methos hadn't picked up his stuff yet. The fact that it looked like everything was still there hadn't reassured him. Methos probably had plenty of practice at just clearing out and leaving everything that didn't matter behind.

He'd spent the next four hours trying to figure out what he would say, desperately hoping he'd have a chance to say something, going over every bit of their conversation, trying to figure out what had caused Methos to explode so he'd know how to approach him -- because it was obviously past time to try and talk things out. Did Methos really think Duncan thought so little of him? Didn't he realize that the exact opposite was true? He wasn't surprised that Methos was leaving; what surprised him was that he'd stayed with him in the first place.

He spent a significant portion of time calling himself every kind of fool for not being what Methos needed, then calling Methos equally unflattering names for being so damn unclear about what he wanted from Duncan. And Duncan knew he wanted something, he just wasn't sure what it was. If only Methos would give him a clue -- one he could understand. At some point he'd realized that he couldn't spend his life waiting like this. Waiting for Methos to come home, waiting for him to leave, waiting for him to decide that he wasn't going to put up with Duncan's possessiveness, his insecurity, any longer.

And then he'd gotten angry. Rather, he finally admitted his own anger, feelings he'd pushed down in hopes that things would just sort themselves out, that Methos would start to trust him just a little bit more. Anger that Methos had left, leaving Duncan to cope with the police and the mall. Methos had never asked, but it had been a close thing that they hadn't arrested _Duncan_ for murder.

And then there were the months of missing him, months of wondering why he'd left, whether he'd be back. Anger at all the times Methos had substituted sarcasm for explanation, silence for communication, remoteness for intimacy. Anger that Methos said he wasn't leaving, but he never acted like he intended to be around for more than a visit.

He had yet to figure out exactly what scared him so much, why the thought of Methos leaving was absolutely terrifying and yet strangely relieving. Maybe it was the idea of having nothing more to live up to. Or maybe it was just that if it was over, he could deal with it and move on, rather than hanging in this limbo of uncertainty.

He hadn't eaten by the time Methos showed up, but the bottle of Scotch they'd had in the cabin had been empty for a good while. His fear and anger, fed by the alcohol, had transformed into a tenuous despair that he tried to keep under control. Perhaps he had more hope left than he'd thought.

"It's late." The words slipped into the darkness like stones into deep water, vanishing quickly into the depths, barely marring the surface calm. Duncan winced inwardly at the sound of his own voice, low and rough with weariness and disuse. He'd meant to sound casual, as if it were his regular habit to sit up till all hours, drinking in the dark, waiting for his lover to return. Instead, he probably sounded like he felt: half dead.

Methos glanced up too fast, locking his gaze on Duncan like a target. His eyes gleamed faintly in the dark, revealing nothing. "I was busy."

The air was perfumed with salt and musk, a light, earthy scent. Duncan took in a lungful of that fragrance and did his best to keep any accusation from his tone, not until he knew what was going on, knowing even as he spoke that he hadn't succeeded very well. "You smell like sex."

"Fancy that."

Duncan felt the bands rip open so that his heart pulsed with a dull ache, pushing pain through his veins like blood. He was lonely and hurt and numb all at once, so detached from his own reactions that he might have been a voyeur, peering in on these world-changing events. Confused feelings and tumultuous thoughts churned inside him, holding him rigid on the small sofa. Methos hadn't left him even the one small area in which he'd felt secure.

"Why? What the hell did I do to deserve that?" Duncan sensed rather than saw the sharp face harden into that familiar mask. He could almost hear the thoughts rushing behind that impenetrable wall like a hidden waterfall, and the words, when they came, chilled him.

"Now, why don't you refresh my memory and tell me exactly when it was that you got your name tattooed on my ass. Was it before, or after you were handed the bill of sale?"

Duncan fought to control his temper, wanting to understand more than he wanted to indulge his feelings. "Damn it! I don't want to own you! I just--"

"Just what? Just want to know where I go and what I do and who I fuck? If that's not ownership, then what? We're not married, and no matter what you think, I'm not your little kept cabin-boy. We've made no promises here, Mac, taken no oaths."

Even through his anger Duncan felt the pain, waiting for him to calm down so it could express itself fully. It had never occurred to him that it was something they needed to discuss. //Would you stay, if I made you promises?// Duncan wondered. For a moment he felt like he'd say anything, do anything -- if it would all just start to make sense. "I think I deserve better than this."

Methos turned on him. "Maybe it wasn't about you, Mac. Maybe I just felt like a good hard fuck with no complications. Because tonight I didn't want to have to be patient, or kind, or particularly understanding. I told her what I wanted her to do, and she did it. And I didn't have to wait, or understand, or be a goddamned sensitive lover." The rich baritone descended into something cold and lethal, the words snapping out like thrown knives in the dark.

Duncan was inhumanly glad he couldn't see Methos' face. If his face had matched the tone of his voice, he wasn't sure what might have happened, what violence he might have done. As it was, his rage and sense of betrayal gave him something to concentrate on besides his own fear and sense of futility. He flung himself off the sofa, pacing, stalking in the dark. "Why don't you tell me exactly when you decided that you don't give a damn about me, or how I feel? Did you think I wouldn't care? Or are you just looking for an excuse to leave so badly that you don't care how much you hurt me in doing so? Because if you're planning on staying with me, by God it _is_ about me. About us."

Methos just looked at him in silence.

"So, is this some statement of emancipation? You want your freedom, it's yours. I don't want to keep you someplace you don't want to be." The words poured out in a flood of pain and release. They'd never talked about the future, about next week, next month, next year. Duncan had just lived day to day, breathing a sigh of relief each night that found Methos still there, a silent prayer that he'd still be there when Duncan awoke. He guessed he'd always known that sooner or later he'd run out of luck.

"If I wanted to go, I don't need to make up excuses to do it, and I sure as hell don't need your permission." Methos poured the words out like poison. "That's kind of the point, now, isn't it?"

Duncan turned on him, clenching his fists to keep himself from striking out, trying to relieve the deadly anger that was consuming him. "What the fuck do you want from me, Methos? What do you need from me? Tell me what to do, because I sure as hell can't figure it out!"

Methos watched him dispassionately, seemingly untouched by Duncan's anger. "You should have been born earlier, Mac. You'd have made a hell of a martyr. Tell me, what bothers you more: the thought of me with someone else, or the fact that you didn't know where I was? Your little wandering satellite drift off without you?"

Duncan felt an almost overwhelming urge to hit him, and he was grateful that he was far out of arm's reach. He took a deep breath and struggled for calm. "Yes, it bothers me. A lot. Does that make you feel better? Are we keeping score? Should I get a paper and write it down?" He stopped himself before he really got going. Rational, right. The Scotch had been a really bad idea. Too bad there wasn't more. "Christ, you are such an asshole."

"I've had a lot of time to practice."

Duncan leaned heavily on the back of the sofa, staring down at the dim outlines of his hands on the fabric. "Why are you doing this? If you want to leave, then go. If you want to sleep around, I can't stop you. I already know you don't need me. You don't need to come back here and rub it in my face. There are easier ways to hurt me, if that's what you want." Like leaving.

Methos stood there rigidly, then sighed audibly, dropping onto the opposite end of the couch and rubbing his hands over his head. "In all honesty, Mac, I have no idea what I was doing. I wasn't thinking. And-- I didn't do it to hurt you. I just needed--"

"What? What the hell did you need?" Duncan wondered if Methos heard all of the pain and bewilderment in his voice.

Methos looked up at him, and Duncan realized he wasn't the only one in pain.

"What am I to you?"

"What?" Duncan looked up, confused at the sudden change of direction. He'd expected another outburst of uncharacteristically bitter anger, not this wistful, melancholy inquiry. His own anger was still building, and this sudden emotional change in direction was like whiplash.

Methos looked up at him, still speaking in that intense, sorrowful tone. "It's not a complicated question. What am I to you, Duncan?"

"Is this multiple choice, or an essay exam?" Methos didn't respond, probably knowing it for the stalling tactic it was. Duncan wasn't sure what Methos was after. The silence stretched out as he thought about the question and what he knew of Methos. The wily bastard was so many different things...

"I'll make it easier for you. Let's start with what I'm not. I'm not your student."

"No," he had to agree. If Duncan ever thought about Methos in terms of a teacher-student relationship, it was usually the other way around. Without ever trying, Methos shed knowledge like a cat shed hair. It was everywhere and unavoidable that some would be picked up.

"Or your teacher, whether you like it, or not." Methos stood up and began pacing closer in the dark room.

Duncan looked at him guiltily.

"And I'm not your woman." Closer, the deep voice carried an indefinable edge now.

"No..."

"You cannot shelter me from my past, or protect me from the Game. You can't depend on me for words of wisdom or answers. And you sure can't lead me around like I was on a leash. I'm not your appendage, MacLeod." As he spoke, he continued the slow advance on the stunned Scot, who retreated step by step until he was backed against a wall. Duncan could smell the salt on Methos' skin and the raw, earthy tang of sex that still clung to him.

"No. I don't want you to be." His response was barely a whisper. There was something both threatening and arousing about the way Methos leaned into his space. Again, Duncan was struck by the difference between his perception and reality. Methos was big, suddenly aggressive, predatory. Dangerous.

Feral.

A tiny jolt of fear, real fear, thrilled through Duncan's body, a single electric line through his chest and gut, down his spine straight to his groin. Oh, God. His anger dissipated, he was hard, more aroused with every breath of the sex-scented air that rolled off Methos in waves. He wanted to drop to his knees and pull Methos' cock into his mouth to see if he could taste the woman he'd fucked earlier, see if he could push this Methos, this wounded, wounding man, into losing control, into burning through all the hesitancies and restraints they'd put on around each other for far too long.

"So what am I?" This was the third time the question had been asked, and this time the ritual demanded answer.

"I... You...you're..." he swallowed hard, struggling through his body's reactions for the words to describe exactly what the old Immortal meant to him, knowing that in ancient times, an incorrect answer to a riddle often meant death. Taking a deep breath, he settled for honesty. "I don't know who the hell you are anymore, Methos. I thought I did, but I don't know who you are right now."

A grim smile touched Methos' lips, but he didn't relent.

"And that's a hell of a question to ask me after you come home after fucking some whore. What's this about? What did you need tonight?" Duncan took a breath and forced himself to finish the question, hating the hard, needy sound of his own voice. "What did you need tonight that I couldn't give you?"

"Someone a little more willing to let me be in control for awhile, maybe." The ache in Methos' voice did nothing to soften the harshness of the whispered words.

Duncan reeled, trying to understand. "Is this about coming back to the States? About this morning? If you didn't want--"

"Yes? If I didn't want, what would you have done? Left me alone? Come on your own and left me to my own devices in Paris? That didn't seem to be an option you were willing to give me." His emphasis made Duncan blush guiltily. "And that's beside the point, anyway -- or only a symptom. Let's start simple, Mac. What about what I do want?" Methos pressed closer, sliding a hand down to curve around Duncan's hip, a leg sliding between Duncan's thighs. "What about this morning?"

Guiltily, Duncan's mind flew back to that morning. Was it only this morning? He'd known...he'd known what Methos wanted, what was being asked of him, and he'd rejected the advance peremptorily, unable to go through with it. Even now he wasn't sure why. Maybe it was just another symptom. How many other times had he done that, dismissed Methos without considering how it seemed to him, just acted on impulse, without thinking? No wonder Methos felt like he was just tagging along.

Looking at him now, Duncan again saw how strong Methos was, how powerful. There was no softness in his gaze, no sign of backing down. Duncan licked his dry lips, wondering what had happened to the easy-going, amenable man he'd lived with all these months. Wondering if he'd been right in saying he didn't really know Methos at all. Wondering why Methos had kept this from him -- and realizing suddenly that he hadn't. He hadn't hidden it at all; Duncan just hadn't wanted to see it. Hadn't wanted to deal with it. So Methos had offered him exactly what he thought Duncan could handle and then waited for the time his lover would be ready to take more. Given the reprieve, Duncan had happily settled in to play house -- his house, his world, his rules. And because Methos hadn't left yet, Duncan had assumed he was happy. Small wonder that he accused Duncan of wanting to own him. Apparently Methos had grown tired of waiting and was looking for a down payment for his patience.

"This morning." Duncan swallowed thickly, fear and arousal pinning him in place as surely as if he were nailed to the floor. "You want to..."

Methos leaned in closer, not touching but still so near that Duncan could feel the heat pouring off of him. "Yes, I want to. Can you say it, Mac? I want to fuck you."

He breathed, forcing himself to say the words. "You want to fuck me..." He felt a shiver of anticipation.

With those words, the lethal mask slipped a bit, and there was a glimmer of the familiar Methos, his Methos, underneath, intense and tender. "That's part of what I want. Yes, I want to be inside you, to take you...I want to show you how good it can be. Sometimes, Duncan, just sometimes, I want to be in control. I want you to give me control. And I want to feel like more than someone who's following you around because I can't seem to leave."

His Methos he could talk to, not those other angry, bitter masks he wore. Not that other man who lashed out blindly, screwing strange women at a moment's notice. "You could have told me," he whispered hoarsely. "I didn't know it was so important to you." Duncan wasn't sure if he was lying, or not, but at that moment it didn't matter.

"I didn't think I'd have to spell it out, Mac. I thought it was pretty clear." Methos slowly placed one hand to either side of Duncan's head, caging him there against the wall, the plaster cool against his back. "And you're willing to do that for me, just because I want it?" Methos tilted his head, looking at him almost curiously.

Heart hammering like it was about to burst, Duncan took a shallow breath of that sex-flavored air, feeling Methos' cock hard against him, and knew he'd do anything Methos wanted, anything at all. He rolled the word out into the dark between them, feeling a tremendous relief. "Yes."

Methos leaned in to capture his mouth, slow and sweet despite his earlier claims of rejecting that softness. Duncan opened to the exploration, the kiss gradually deepening as they waded out into these untested waters. He imagined he could taste the lingering flavor of the woman Methos had been with earlier. One long, denim-sheathed thigh slid between Duncan's legs with insidious pressure, and his breath caught, his eyes closing. Excitement and fear were a potent cocktail, making his head light and his limbs heavy. The warm room was suddenly cold and airless, his heart thudding in his chest, lungs screaming for oxygen faster than he could draw it in. God, he wanted this, wanted Methos. Wanted to give him this.

Methos pulled back slowly until they were no longer touching, and Duncan felt chilled all over at the loss of that heated contact. Duncan's mouth was hot and swollen, achingly empty, abandoned. He opened his eyes slowly, looking up to see that same cold, curious look in Methos' eyes, as if he was untouched by their kiss. Their eyes locked, faces defined by shadows. Methos shook his head slowly, never losing contact with Duncan's eyes.

"I don't think so, Mac. I lost my taste for rape long ago, and I have no use for a martyr." Methos pushed himself away from the wall and walked off into the other room.

Duncan remained there against the wall, trembling, feeling burned, branded. After long minutes he heard the shower running.

* * *

Methos leaned forward and let the inadequate flow of hot water drizzle down over the top of his head. //God, you are such a selfish bastard,// he accused himself. Here he was, taking again as he was always taking. Mac had never done anything lately but give in the only ways he knew how, and selfish bastard that Methos was, he wanted _more_.

The girl tonight had been lovely and pliant, accepting his use and abuse of her body without complaint or hesitation. He was gentle, and she smiled at him. He was rough, and she thanked him for it. He sweated and strained and sought his own pleasure with no thought of hers, commanding her with monosyllabic grunts. Turn, up, yes, hard, fast, no, suck, yes, there...

He'd finished, crying out internally at the emptiness of the exchange, physically exhausted and emotionally dead. He'd finished, and she asked to be paid. So much simpler, when you knew their price up front...

* * *

_Virginia City, Nevada  
September 19, 1875_

_Morning came with a blast of cheerful yellow sunshine and the smell of coffee. Methos stumbled out of bed with every intention of finding the person responsible for scheduling morning so early in the day and killing them. Preferably killing them quietly, with a minimum of fuss, and then going back to bed. With Elinore._

_The floorboards were cool under his bare feet as he pulled on his trousers and followed the enticing smell to the kitchen._

_He blinked, double-checking the identity of the small, radiant woman bustling about covered in flour, cooking pancakes. Ultimately it was the familiarity of the shabby blue apron that identified her._

_"Good morning." Elinore pressed a hot cup of coffee into his hands and motioned for him to sit while she finished up, turning back to the heavy cast iron skillet and the golden cakes rising there. As she glanced at him over her shoulder he saw the first completely unguarded smile he'd ever seen on her face._

_"Good morning," he replied, still somewhat stunned._

_He watched her, fascinated at the transformation. He might have sworn that his Elinore had been stolen in the night and replaced with this gay creature, like a changeling in an old faerie story. She bounced, she hummed, she turned the flapjacks like she'd never seen one before._

_The misshapen cakes were set in front of him, along with a small can of warm syrup. She sat across from him, sipping her own cup of coffee, watching him eat with more concentration than the activity warranted. He ate, still looking to her for clues on how to proceed. If he hadn't known better, he'd have said that she'd poisoned the pancakes and was looking for the lethal effects of her handiwork. Her dark eyes drifted, losing focus, and a flicker of confusion crossed her face._

_Methos lowered his forkful of semi-liquid pastry. "What is it?"_

_To his never-ending surprise, she blushed, smiling up at him shyly. "What do you think we should name him?"_

_His turn to be confused. "Name who?" Did she want a puppy, like little Mary? They could get a dog. He thought there was a new litter at Kirby's house..._

_The brown gaze again lost its focus, her voice low and dreamlike. "The baby. What should we name the baby?"_

_His flesh crept coldly across his shoulders. "Elinore..."_

_She shook her head and laughed, smoothing her hands down her waist and over the threadbare apron. "Oh, I know it might take a few months before we can be sure, but Jack..."_

_"You want a child?" He knew better than to ask the question, especially when he already had the answer he needed. His voice betrayed him, though, and the words fell from his lips. His fork struck the plate with a clatter._

_Pure confusion in Elinore's face, like he was speaking a foreign language she had never heard. He could see the tension in her arms, the delicate muscles standing out as her hands twisted, out of sight in her lap. "Well, yes. Don't you? Isn't that why...?"_

_Something low in Methos' chest began to ache at her simple confession. She craved a child, a son of his body -- not him. He could well imagine the babe, grown to a man. He might have been tall, like himself, with the fine bones of his mother and her sad, intelligent brown eyes. Dark hair and his own unfortunate nose, a love for books and no skill for cooking. A man who would never hold a sword in his hand or know the smell of war._

_It was a game he had played when he was younger, with other wives, imagining their children. This feature of his and that of hers...How they would grow and who they would marry and what trade they would follow. And privately, in his own heart, Methos grieved for them, just a little. Mortal children of mortal mothers, doomed to fade and die, if only in his imaginings. He had stopped playing that particular game long ago. There was enough real grief in the world._

_Elinore, poor fractured doll, broken-winged bird. He would have given her anything -- travel, home, safety, promises of his heart, his love, if she had asked it -- anything. And she craved the one thing he could never provide._

_He wasn't sure if he hurt more for her sake, or his own._

_Apprehension grew in her nervous posture and expression as the silence drew out. Birds sang outside the window, but the sunlight was cold on his neck._

_"Jack, what's the matter? Don't you want a child?"_

_Methos pushed away from the table, needing distance, space, motion to absorb some of the restless feelings rising in him. He'd known better than to ask. Briefly, he thought about lying to her and pretending to try for a baby. He could let her have the fantasy and pick names. He could even go so far as to build an extra room on the small house for the infant that would never come. And he knew there would never be one. Elinore would never betray him that way, filling her womb in the bed of another man._

_He leaned hard against the counter. It was too cruel to lie to her and let her hope. "There won't be any children."_

_He could hear her face falling, the denial and disbelief in her voice. "What do you mean? Of course there will. I'm not barren. I've...I've had a child before."_

_"There won't be any children, Elinore. It's me. I can't give them to you."_

_"Are you sure? How can you know?"_

_"Because I know. No children. I'm sorry." If he repeated it often enough, maybe she would believe him. He couldn't look at her, couldn't bear to see the heartbreak in her face._

_When at last the silence compelled him to look, he expected to see any number of things -- tears, grief, anger, even hatred of him for denying her the only thing she'd ever really asked for -- but there was little expression on her face at all. She stared down at her clasped hands with haunted eyes, pale and fine as a porcelain doll, so still she might not have been breathing._

_"Elinore? I'm so sorry..."_

_She stood and began clearing the table with steady hands. "Can I get you some more coffee?"_

_Methos shook his head mutely, stopping when he noticed that she didn't look at him. "No, thank you."_

_She bobbed her head in what might have been a nod. "Excuse me then. I need to take care of the mess."_

_The next few weeks were consumed in a fury of scrubbing and canning. The apples were ripe, and the squash. Elinore baked and preserved and canned until the pantry shelves were full, and then she just stacked the brimming jars on the floor. Apple jelly, apple butter, preserved pie filling, quart jars of cider, some set aside unsealed to ferment, and every manner of vegetable she could eke from the late-season garden found their way in beside the tomatoes and apricots and pickles and corn. She made him four new shirts, a knitted scarf for the winter, and scoured everything that would hold still, until her knuckles bled. In some places the floorboards were bleached white._

_She rose before him and frequently retired after, even when he urged her to rest, never complaining. Dark circles showed under her eyes, but she waved off his concern, answering only, "It will snow soon."_

_The weather remained unseasonably warm and dry. Elinore never sought Methos' physical attentions again, or accepted his touch for more than a moment._

_And if she ever cried, he never saw it._

* * *

He felt the rush of cool air as Mac came into the bathroom, like Daniel into the lion's den. He put another checkmark on Mac's side of the invisible scorecard he was keeping tonight. Mac was either braver or stupider than he'd thought, and he'd never made the mistake of thinking Mac was stupid. He didn't look up from his contemplation of the tiles as the door closed behind him.

"Get out," he commanded harshly. The last thing he needed was to feel those sorrowful, brooding eyes on him. He felt badly enough. Maybe Mac was right, he was just looking for an excuse to get out. Funny, he'd never thought of himself as a coward.

The silence resumed, absorbing the words completely, as if they had never been spoken. His ears were filled with the steady hiss and gurgle of the hot spray on his head. The bathroom door didn't open again. He thought about revising his opinion of Mac's intelligence. //To Hell with it.// He grabbed a rag and began scouring himself clean, brutally scrubbing away the stench of the prostitute and her cheap perfume.

She had left him exhausted and angry, more at himself than anything else, and feeling grimy, dirty down to his bones. She hadn't had what he wanted. Fuck, he didn't even know if he knew what he wanted anymore, except to be away from here, from his own claustrophobic neediness. He deserved everything Mac had thrown at him, but he couldn't seem to admit that, couldn't seem to expose himself that badly, even now that things had begun a desperate, inevitable spiral downward. He scrubbed harder, washing his hair with the bar of soap rather than fumble for the shampoo bottle.

Rinsing quickly, he shut off the water with a vicious twist to the taps and flung open the door, reaching for a towel. Mac was sitting on the toilet lid, waiting.

"Haven't we said enough?" Methos made no attempt to disguise his tiredness. The towel was far too soft to give him the raw, nearly flayed feeling he was looking for. He scrubbed harder, trying to rub away the panic that was setting in.

Mac stood, the rigid, angry posture of his body completely at odds with the desolate sound of his voice. "When are you leaving?"

Methos halted the motion of the towel through his hair as the feeling flowed away from his hands. Already faintly sick from sleeplessness and general turmoil, he'd been looking forward to finishing his shower, exchanging a few more snipes with Mac, and going to bed. The sudden shock as Mac's words registered made his head throb. He didn't know why he was surprised, after the exchange they'd had, but he found he was. "Are you throwing me out?"

Mac shifted, the flow of thoughts clear on his face as he struggled for words. "Methos...you're obviously unhappy here with me. I'm not what you want; I can't give you what you want. Just do me the courtesy of telling me before you go."

Methos stared at him, not quite believing what he was doing. He dropped the towel on the floor, the words flowing angrily before he even realized what he was saying. "God damn you, you self-righteous prick! Don't you dare go all noble and self-sacrificing on me! You'd like that, wouldn't you? Do the good and right and proper thing and let me out of this relationship, be the one to put your own wants aside, take the blame, and say goodbye so that I can ride off into the fucking sunset and find true happiness. It's not that easy this time, Mac; you don't get to have the high ground."

Mac colored angrily, losing some of the tense restraint in his posture as his voice rose. "I'm not looking for the high ground! I just...I can't do this anymore. You said it first. We haven't made any promises here; we've _never_ made any promises to each other! There's no reason for you to stay if this isn't what you want. It's not doing either of us any good, and I'm sure it won't be hard for you to find someone to give you a better time."

Methos winced at the bitterness of the last remark, the silence lying between them like a chasm. One by one his shields slammed into place. He would not show Mac how much it hurt, knowing that it was better for Mac if he left. Every detail of the tiny room was shockingly etched in Methos' awareness. The moist heat of the air, the sharp, green scent of the soap, the cheerful yellow tiles covered with a fine film of mist, even the textured weave of the bathmat under his feet would remain with him, perfectly preserved in his memory. He was absurdly naked, weaponless, underdressed for the occasion in the extreme. Mac blocked the only exit, stalking back and forth across the doorway like a caged cat trying to convince itself that the dish of meat being offered was poisoned.

Watching him pace, seeing the harsh lines of his face, Methos wanted to grab him and slam him against the wall, try to knock some sense into him. //_You_ are what I want, all I want! Can't you get that through your thick, stubborn head?// But Methos had done an excellent job of making sure Mac wouldn't believe that, hadn't he? His head began to pound again. Immortals shouldn't have to get headaches. He felt himself shutting down, moving into straight survival mode. You couldn't survive if it hurt too much.

"Fine. I'll be out of your hair as soon as I can get dressed." Methos went back to drying his hair.

Mac's voice was rough and quiet, rubbing against Methos' nerves like gravel on a scraped knee. "I'm sorry, Methos. This-- It isn't what I wanted."

"You and me both, Duncan." More blanket apologies, absolutely sincere and equally meaningless. Methos pushed past him into the bedroom and began jerking on his clothes in the half-light spilling from the bathroom door. Refusing to look at Mac for fear he'd just fall apart. Such a delightful, maddening combination of keen insight and stubborn blindness. Times like this he wasn't sure whether to kiss him or slap him.

"Where will you go?"

Methos glanced up, lacing his boots with sure fingers even in the inadequate light. "I'll find someplace."

Mac looked hesitant. "All the hotels are full."

"Like you said, I'm sure I can find someone to entertain me."

There was a long silence, and when Mac spoke, Methos almost bled at the thinly disguised pain in his voice. "Don't go like this."

Methos closed his eyes, shutting out the beautiful sight of him. This was harder than he'd imagined it would be. "You know I can't stay like this."

There was nothing Mac could really say to that, and he didn't even try, watching silently as Methos gathered his bag and walked out, shutting the door behind him.

* * *

_...though he'd never seen it, the place was familiar, as were the low sounds of animals and the sleepy murmur of the nearby village preparing for the dark. He was cold, the damp, tall grass tickling his legs with icy fingers as he followed a single beacon through the gathering dark, the faint, golden light from a farmhouse promising warmth and companionship, shelter from the night, food and drink._

_A girl's scream cut through the gloom, stripping away the somnolent lassitude of the scene._

_Hurry._

_Suddenly he was running, heart racing, flying over the low meadow, the firm mud giving under his boots, the grass clutching at his legs, trying to slow him. He had to be faster than this, had to get there in time... He needed to run, to be there, to help the girl, but no matter how fast he ran he seemed no closer..._

_Hurry__._

_...and then he was inside, searching frantically for the source of that cry. It was dark and smoky, and...red. Fire and shattered crockery and blood, everywhere blood. Too much blood and destruction for one body. How many had died here? It looked like a slaughterhouse. The metallic reek of it hit him like a blow, overwhelming him, making his stomach churn even as his eyes continued searching, combing the dark, red room._

_There._

_Motion and a swatch of yellow hair were enough to spur him to action, yanking on the shabby tunic and long hair of her assailant and pulling him away. Reed-thin, the man weighed less than nothing as MacLeod flung him aside. Blood, so much blood... The girl was dead, covered in blood and bruises, her dress torn and bunched around her waist, blue eyes staring sightlessly, one slender arm twisted at an impossible angle. Her beautiful face was shattered, bearing the stark imprints of wide knuckles._

_He was too late._

_Rage and helpless hurt mingled; it was hard to breathe, hard to see with his eyes flooding. He whirled on her attacker, ready to mete out punishment then and there. The pathetic, reedy little man hadn't moved, hadn't tried to run. He just sat there rocking and keening, covered in her blood. MacLeod jerked him up again, tearing the rotting fabric of the filthy tunic, dragging the man up to face him. Wide hazel eyes stared at him out of the sharp, blood-spattered face, uncomprehending._

_"Methos?"_

_MacLeod dropped him with a reflexive jerk, as if he'd discovered himself to be holding something unclean. He shouldn't be here, couldn't be here. He looked back to the body to confirm what he already knew..._

_Only to see Methos, his Methos, lying in her place, broken and bloody, wide eyes staring sightlessly._

_"What...?"_

_"It's all right, Mac."_

_Confusion made his head swim as he turned again to face that other wretched specter who had resumed rocking on the dirt floor, hugging his skinny knees, long, matted hair obscuring his face. MacLeod reached out, and Methos flinched away from him, staring at the sword suddenly in MacLeod's hand._

_MacLeod dropped the katana like a snake. "I won't hurt you."_

_The eyes still stared at him, flicking briefly to the corpse behind him before returning to their steady regard. "Won't you?"_

_Only then did MacLeod realize he was covered in fresh blood._

* * *

Duncan woke to find himself sitting bolt upright, staring down at his outspread hands. He was shaking, still expecting to see crimson stains on his chest and arms. Falling back to the pillows, he waited for his racing heartbeat to calm, the dream still vivid in his mind. What the hell was that all about? Hadn't he come to terms with Methos' past yet? Or was it even about his past? The dream kept blurring into the bitter exchange of the night before, and with Methos gone, there wasn't much point in dwelling on that. Duncan closed his eyes. He kept seeing the injured, yet resigned, look in the dream Methos' eyes, making him feel vaguely guilty, which made no sense. Wasn't he the one who'd been hurt? He tried to make sense of things, but he found he just couldn't deal with it right now, couldn't stay in the cabin a moment longer. He climbed out of bed and washed quickly, throwing on some clothes.

With a mixture of determination and regret, he abandoned the confining spaces, overcrowded with memories as they were, and walked up the highway that skirted the Lake. Looking out over the blue perfection of the water and the light mist that still clung to the far shore at this early hour, it was easy to imagine that it had existed thus, inviolate, since the inception of the world, set down by the hand of some benevolent deity. A mirrored sapphire placed amid the rugged glory of the Sierras.

Standing 6200 feet above sea level and reaching over 1600 feet deep into the heart of the mountains, the Washoe Indians of the region had had no name for it, calling it only "tahoe," their word for lake; for them it needed no other label. It was fitting, now, that the entire world called it such. It was Tahoe, the Lake, as if there were no other lake in the world. He'd always loved the Lake. He wondered if he could stand to come back.

Almost blindly, he turned in to a small roadside diner, absently noting the sign, "On The Rocks Bar &amp; Grill," as he pushed open the old-fashioned Dutch door and followed the smell of food inside. His stomach growled as it took keen notice of the scents of eggs and pastry, syrup and smoked meats and coffee. He'd missed dinner last night, as his stomach was quick to remind him. With a sigh, he yielded to its insistent demand and waited for a seat.

It was crowded but quiet at the tail end of the breakfast rush, the diners appearing to be mostly locals, reading their newspapers and books as they finished the last of their juice or coffee. Scattered about were a handful of tourists, sunburned and excited, chattering and waving cameras, or peering intently at roadmaps, jotting notes on napkins. A young man in the back corner sported a T-shirt from the rival music fest up here, the Jammin' Jelly Jazz &amp; Blues Festival.

"You ready? Just one?"

He snapped out of his crowd-watching daze and nodded, following the hostess to a side booth in the no-smoking section. He slid across the cracked vinyl seat and accepted a place setting from her. Leaning on one hip, she tiredly recited the specials from memory and handed him a menu. "Beth will be with you in a minute."

"Thank you," he called to her back as she trudged off with the same weary gait.

The menu was everything he expected: traditional breakfast fare at inflated, tourism-conscious prices. He was still trying to decide between the hash-brown skillet and the pancake combo when Beth appeared at his elbow. "You ready?"

He glanced up at her. The phrase and inflection must be some sort of waitress rite of passage. Beth was everything the hostess was not. Caught somewhere between youth and middle age, she was lovely in a dark, peasant way, despite the dowdy uniform. She shifted restlessly on her feet, but gave the impression of being eager to get his order rather than expressing impatience at his silence. Propping a hand on a full hip, she looked earthy and fertile, motherly and sensual in a pagan way. She would have been a captivating beauty if she took better care of herself.

"Mister?" She adjusted her glasses and smiled at him, and he revised his opinion. She was a beauty now, yellow apron and all.

"Uh... no. Can I have a few more minutes, please?"

"Sure thing. Thought I'd lost you there. Don't blow my record for me, okay? I haven't had a customer die in, oh...'bout a month now." She squinted playfully at him and brushed back a stray wisp of dark hair. "Get you some coffee while you think it over? Juice?"

"Coffee, please." She blushed when he smiled at her. Then she went off to fetch the decanter with a bouncy, ground-eating stride, her feet barely seeming to touch the carpet.

He resumed staring out the window, filling his eyes with the landscape and trees, not quite able to glimpse the water from this angle. He was spectacularly unsuccessful in not thinking of Methos. Being brutally honest with himself, it had been almost a relief to wake in an empty bed this morning, even with the shock of the dream, as if the other shoe had finally dropped and he could let go of the nervous anticipation of waiting. Methos had left him.

Methos was gone. He tried out the phrase internally, testing the edges of it like a new blade. A remarkably numb feeling followed, as though the past year had been a dream. No...if it were truly over between them, it would be as if the past eight years of the old Immortal's company had evaporated. Methos wouldn't be coming back now, or in a decade, or ever. He'd never tease Duncan about his chivalry, or poach his beer, or leave his books spread over the coffee table. He'd never again wake Duncan in the small hours of the night with kisses, pressing an erection into his hand.

The thought left a surprising void inside him, a loneliness he hadn't expected, a sharp grief. It felt uncomfortably like Methos had died. He twisted away from that thought, flashing on the body from his dream, remembering the painfully tender kiss they had shared last night and the cold abandonment when Methos had left to shower. He should have pursued the matter more forcefully, should have kept him from leaving and...

And what? He had offered what Methos said he wanted. He had wanted it himself! If that had truly been his need, the lack he felt, Duncan was sure that he'd have found himself tumbled to the floor and taken in short order. No, whatever it was, it wasn't just the sex. He was sure that the quiz about Methos' role in his life lay somewhere near the heart of it, but Methos being Methos, he seldom gave a complete or wholly accurate answer to any question. Even the right question. And Duncan was beginning to realize that in a very real way, Methos was right -- it wasn't all about Duncan. It wasn't all his fault, and he couldn't just fix it, no matter how much he might want to. And unless Methos opened up some more, decided to work with him, it was probably best to just let it go. And since when had he done what was best for him?

The rounded silhouette of the waitress hovered once again off the end of the table, offering more coffee. She smiled knowingly as she refilled the cup. "Need a little more time? You're welcome to take as long as you want."

"No, that's fine. Can I have the pancakes, please?" He'd lost his appetite, but he knew he'd only regret it later if he didn't eat something. He almost laughed at the irony of it. Survival was the first order of business. Methos would be proud. And he'd need all the energy he could muster.

He didn't really think he'd be able to find Methos if he had decided to disappear like he had last year, but he knew, too, that he'd never forgive himself if he didn't make the attempt. He'd start with Joe.

* * *

Circus Circus Hotel &amp; Casino  
Reno, Nevada  
August 16, 2003

Even before he opened his eyes, he knew it was going to be a rough ride. Usually he went from sound asleep to wide awake with little effort. This morning, however, his eyes didn't seem to want to cooperate, and his mouth tasted like something had crawled in and given birth before dying. Sinking back into sleep seemed the best option, but he knew it wasn't going to happen. He sighed and stretched, giving his eyes a few more moments to adjust, reaching for the warm body that should lie stretched along his back. When he felt nothing but empty space, he realized that Duncan must be in the bathroom, where he heard running water, but something about that idea felt wrong.

Full awareness returned quickly as he lay still, searching his senses for what was out of place. His head swam faintly with what might have been a hangover in a mortal, but any amount of liquor sufficient to make his head groggy the next morning would likely have killed a mortal several times over. God...what had he been thinking last night? Oh...Mac. He pressed his head into the pillow. Maybe if he smothered himself and died, his head would feel better when he came back, and he could avoid the morning after recriminations that were sure to take place. Then his eyes shot open as he figured out what was wrong: the silence in his mind that was usually filled with the song of Mac's Immortality, something he didn't really notice unless it wasn't there. And it smelled wrong, too. Everything smelled wrong. And if he'd stormed out on Mac last night, then who...

Still feeling groggy, Methos looked around the room. Oh, God, had he let himself be picked up? The mood he was in, he wouldn't put it past him to have done such an incredibly stupid thing. As he sat up, he realized that he was considerably less clothed than he had been the last time he'd been aware of such things. And peering under the blankets, it got worse: no, these were definitely not the boxers he'd been wearing the night before. He dropped his head on his knees, hunting his memory for curses sufficiently creative and vituperative to curse him for a fool. When he was done, feeling somewhat more clearheaded, if no better, he glanced dazedly around the room, looking for clues to what had happened. His bag was on the floor by the bed, which explained the change of underwear -- in part.

The guitar was a good clue. //Joe. Has to be Joe.// And he knew nothing would have happened with Joe. Unless it wasn't Joe. It wasn't like Reno didn't have a superabundance of musicians at the moment. He glanced around for his clothes, wanting something to put between him and whoever was in the bathroom, but there wasn't a sign of them. Sighing, he began composing an apology. //Gee, Mac, sorry I was such an asshole last night, can we work it out? Well, yes, I did actually mean most of the things I said, but...// No, he'd have to do better than that. He was genuinely sorry they'd fought like that, but the underlying issues were still there and would have to be addressed eventually.

A gruff, sleepy voice drifted from the bathroom door. "You feel like talking about it?"

Methos turned his head too fast, and the room spun dizzily. "Joe?"

Joe tossed a wadded-up towel behind him. "That's me, in the flesh."

"Joe, I...ah..." He fumbled for the right words to say, at the same time fumbling in his mind for a clue as to what he'd said the night before, how much Joe already knew. "What happened to my clothes?" Stalling. That was good.

"You put back more alcohol last night that any seven men could do. It was pretty impressive. You really want to know what happened to your clothes, or will you just take my word that they needed washing?"

"Well, when you put it that way..." Methos swallowed, vividly imagining the potential state of his clothes. He owed Joe much more than a simple thank you for this one. Reaching for his bag, he glanced over at Joe. "Okay if I use your bath?"

"Isn't it a bit late to ask, after we've already slept together?" Methos' felt his face freeze, and Joe laughed. "Calm down, old-timer. Hell, I'm not even sure you were still breathing when you hit the mattress. And even if you were my type, and you aren't, necrophilia is not numbered among my private pleasures. Get up and get dressed. The stuff you had on last night should be back from the laundry soon. And don't worry, you get to pay for it. I'll get us some breakfast, and then you and I are gonna talk, my friend."

* * *

A hot shower, clean clothes, and black coffee went a long way toward calming Methos' sense of dread and soothing his throbbing headache. It didn't matter that the alcohol was long since purged from his system. This headache was purely stress-induced. His neck felt like a column of steel cables, all knotted and strained to the breaking point. Any more pressure and he felt as if his head might literally fly from his shoulders of its own accord.

//Well, it would certainly save Mac the trouble of killing me himself,// he thought. That had been a lovely scene last night, so perfect in form and content that he doubted he could have consciously planned it any better. One of their best! Pity it had achieved almost the exact opposite of what he really wanted. Of course, what had he expected, showing back up at the cabin, obviously reeking of sex? They'd never actually talked monogamy, but he knew it had been assumed. He'd just...well, it was a hell of a blow for freedom, he could say that much. God...Nobody rattled him like Duncan did. He'd been feeling more than a bit guilty, but as soon as Mac spoke, all Methos' good intentions went out the window, and he went on the defensive. Why was it that every time they really needed to talk all of his careful, thought-out, reasoned arguments went straight out the window, and he caught himself shouting insults and accusations? //Let's be fair, it's not every time, just every time it's important. Personally important,// he amended. //Save the world? Sure, no problem. Talk about problems, or something I want? No way.//

"Methos...? _Adam_!"

He jumped a bit, startled. "I'm sorry, Joe, what?"

"More coffee?" The decanter was waggled in his direction.

"Oh, yeah. Thanks." The coffee was hot and black and entirely too strong. He deliberately burned his mouth on it, using the pain as a focus. //This is real,// he thought. //_This_ is pain, not the insignificant little whining MacLeod subjects me to.// The problem was that he didn't believe it himself.

Joe sipped from his own cup, observing Methos over the rim with eyes that saw entirely too much. Methos was spending a lot of time feeling transparent lately. "You had quite a lot to say last night," he remarked, apropos of nothing visible, entirely too casual.

The room was suddenly cold and too small for comfort. Methos felt like the chair was shrinking, sinking into the bland carpet. "I did?"

"Yeah. Man, I'm still trying to figure out what language you were cursing in. Whatever it was, it was loud and sounded like you had to hack up a hairball." Joe's tone was still deceptively light. They might have been at the bar discussing baseball, or Methos' latest musical interest, or imported beer. He sensed rather than heard the steely reproach underlying the words themselves.

"I don't suppose this was here, was it?" He gestured at the hotel room, knowing it was too much to hope for.

Joe snorted indelicately. "In your dreams. You gave everyone at the bar who was willing to listen an earful. Combination language lesson and relationship advice. Dave came and got me about 3:30."

Gripping the coffee mug, Methos winced inwardly at what wasn't being said. He had made a royal ass of himself last night, and it had been up to Joe to rescue him from it and make sure he didn't get relieved of his inebriated head in the bargain. Thank you didn't begin to touch the debt he owed this man. "God. No matter how long I live, I never cease to marvel at my own capacity for self-humiliation."

"Well, you were certainly in rare form last night. So, what are you going to do?"

Methos blinked and sipped at the road tar masquerading as coffee. "About what?"

"It's a little late to play coy on this one. Those few friends and associates who hadn't figured out you and Mac were sharing sheets had that oversight corrected last night. When are you going back to face the music?"

"Don't you mean 'are you going back'?"

"No, I mean when. I was content to stay out of it this time, but you had to go and put me smack in the middle by getting me dragged into it last night. So, when are you gonna get out of my hair and go make nice?"

This coffee had to be penance for a mortal sin in some religion. "I don't know if I can go back, Joe. I may have burned that bridge last night."

"You want to talk about it?" He leaned forward across the small table, all sincerity.

Methos eyed him dubiously. "You really want to hear it?"

"You can spare me the sordid details, but yeah. Sometimes it helps to talk about it. Besides, I think you owe me the story for the room and board last night." The Watcher turned away for a moment, ignoring the pre-measured filter-packs provided with the room to scoop his own blend for a fresh pot.

"I can make that, if you like..."

"Sit down. You complaining about the coffee?"

"No."

"Didn't think so. Now, you were saying about you and MacLeod...?"

Methos shifted restlessly, finally yielding to the urge to stand and pace, seeking some comfort in motion. "I really don't want to talk about this right now, Joe."

"Fine, but you're going to have to talk about it eventually. If you leave it for later it'll only fester." Joe paused. "Unless you're planning on just leaving. You willing to give up like that?"

"Sometimes it's easier, Joe." Methos could feel Joe's eyes following him around the room before he spoke again.

"Is that how you've survived so long? Doing what's easiest, over doing what's right? Or doing what you want?"

Methos looked at him sharply. "What do you know about what I want?"

"I don't know what's happening between the two of you that makes you feel a need to get soused and publicly hack up hairballs at 3 a.m., but I know this: until recently Mac was happier with you than I have seen him in a long time. Since Tessa. So were you, for that matter. You're like a couple of teenagers in love. For your own sakes, and the sake of everyone caught in the blast radius, work it out."

Methos tossed back the last of his coffee with a grimace. "Love, or the lack of it, was never our problem, Joe."

Frustrated, Joe scratched his beard, looking up with those eyes that seemed to see everything. "So, what's the trouble?"

"You know how they say love conquers all, Joe? Well, they lied." Turning away again, Methos touched his wrist. He'd left his watch in the bathroom last night and grasped at the chance to change the subject. "What time is it? I have to go. You playing again today?"

"No. Got a set tomorrow at 4:00."

"I'll be there." Avoiding Joe's eyes, he didn't stop to pick up his clothes.

"Methos?"

He stopped at the door, reluctantly. "Yeah, Joe?"

"Love doesn't do the fighting. It just defines the battle zone."

Methos paused a moment before moving out the door. "Thanks, Joe. I'll see you around."

He made his way out of the hotel, wincing at the bright sunshine. It took him awhile to find out where he'd parked the night before. Things were coming back to him in bits and pieces, and though it wasn't quite as bad as Joe had led him to believe, it was bad enough. He seemed to remember Vanessa in there someplace, telling him he really didn't deserve Mac. He was willing to concede that she was right. Mac would definitely be better off without him, whether he admitted it or not. And at least his failings wouldn't cost Mac much more than a few restless weeks, months at most. Sometimes the cost was so much higher...

  


* * *

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

* * *

_Virginia City, Nevada  
October 26, 1875  
(6:23 am)_

_Methos sighed and scratched at his nose, knowing that he was leaving a wide streak of white dust across his face as he did so. There was no help for it. He could start the day perfectly clean, be as tidy as he could, and still end up looking as if he'd been rolled in flour and grit, like a leg of chicken to be pan-fried. Today he worked alone, perched atop a rickety cradle, facing the exterior wall of Monaghan's mercantile with some fancy imported stone scroll-work the Irishman wanted. It was careful, slow work, the stone both heavy and delicate, and it had to be positioned perfectly so that the seams aligned._

_The wind blew strongly from the west, and he turned his back to it, letting it cool the sweat that was already turning the stone-dust into an itchy glue that adhered to his skin. He snorted and reached for his trowel, resigned. It was going to be another unseasonably hot day. At this early hour the wind was cool, but not cold, and there was still no hint of moisture in the air. He glanced up at the sunrise behind the far hills and extinguished his lantern. From the workman's cradle he could see most of the city, down the hill to St. Mary's of the Mountains and St. Paul's Episcopal standing side by side like sisters vying for the attention of a single suitor._

_Behind them lay Chinatown and nearby, his own tiny house where Elinore was doubtless readying to cook something utterly inedible for lunch._

_The brisk wind was filled with the sweet scent of a cookfire. Maybe in the spring he and Elinore could leave here. He thought Heinrich Schliemann was still excavating Troy, and if not, surely there were other places in the world yet to see. He could take Elinore to see the Taj Mahal..._

_Shouting erupted behind him, and the smell of smoke intensified. "Fire!" a man's voice cried out._

* * *

_(10:13 am)_

_Driven by the wind, and the dryness of the wood and grass, the fire spread faster than the swarming firemen could keep up with it. Fire engines from the Eagle Engine Co. #3 and from the Knickerbocker #5 had been lost before Methos' eyes, cut off by the sea of flames._

_The sound was deafening. Gunshots cracked through the thick air, men and women and horses screamed in pain and fright, glass shattered under the force of the heat with a curiously bright sound, buildings fell, and everywhere was the living roar of the fire itself. The flame spared nothing. It consumed wood and brick alike, leaping easily across the wide streets now cluttered with furniture and other goods abandoned in the rush to safety._

_The heat at Methos' back was overwhelming as he worked, shovel in hand, clearing a firebreak at the entrance to the Ophir mine shaft._

_"Jack!" The voice was familiar, but the face was the same soot-black mask worn by all those trying to save the town from total destruction. White eyes and teeth gleamed at him as the man shouted over the fire. "Jack! Leave that. We're going to dynamite it!"_

_Methos swabbed his face on his shirt and swallowed, tasting the ash in the air. "What?" he shouted._

_"Dynamite!" The man, Kirby, Methos realized, cried back. "The headworks have already caught on the far side. We have to seal it, or lose the whole shaft!"_

_Leaning heavily on his shovel, Methos nodded his understanding. If the wooden timbers in the mines caught, the whole of the Comstock would be wiped out. It wasn't so much that he cared about squeezing the hillside below for all the gold and silver that could be eked from it, but he'd come to care for these hardy, generous, reckless people that worked the mines and the town above. He panted and mopped at his face, looking around at the utter devastation._

_The fire already licked at the western face of the Ophir headworks. All the men from the mine had been evacuated, and Kirby and a small group of others ran about the building, setting dynamite charges that would seal the shaft and prevent the fire from going underground. Methos moved back to a safe distance and lay prone on the ground as the charge was detonated._

_Even so, he felt bruised all over._

_He picked himself up and almost brushed reflexively at his shirt before stopping himself. He was as black and sooty as Kirby was. "Where next?"_

_Kirby mopped a sleeve across his brow and pointed to the south and the Consolidated Virginia mine dump that blocked their view of most of the city, visible over the heaping mounds of dirt only as a smoky heat shimmer. "Gene said that Mackay was going over to seal the collar of the Con. Virginia shaft."_

_Something inside Methos went cold at the words. "What? How far has the fire spread?"_

_Scratching at his neck, Kirby shrugged. "I'm not sure. Last I heard, St. Mary's had caught, and there's not much hope for saving Chinatown..."_

_Methos never heard the rest. He threw down his shovel and ran._

* * *

_Too far, too far around the bulk of the Con. Virginia dump, around the burning rubble of Chinatown. Union Street was still largely clear, but H Street was already deserted and aflame. He picked his way across the piles of abandoned belongings discarded in the haste to flee the fire and approached his house with a tangible sense of dread._

_The small wood-frame house with the cheerful yellow door was already burning on the south and west sides, the apple and apricot trees gone, and the rest of the garden was buried under a layer of charred rubble and soot. He kicked open the door, fanning aside the heavy smoke._

_"Elinore!" The tidy parlor was gray with smoke and soot, the air thick and unbearably hot. The kitchen was in flames, but he checked it anyway. Jars of preserves exploded from the heat with sharp pops, adding the stench of burned fruit and pickles to the air._

_"ELINORE!" He cried out again, deliberately not thinking of reasons that she might still be in the house and not answer him, already fearing the answer. His heart pounded from exertion and dread._

_He found her in the bedroom, lying down on the bed as if in sleep, her dark hair loose and fanned out across the coverlet, that awful, threadbare apron clutched in one bluish hand. Gasping in the dense smoke, not caring that he burned his throat, he touched her with gentle care. He was unsurprised at the boneless flexibility of her limbs, at the dry, half-lidded eyes that stared up at him from the livid face. She had been dead for at least half an hour, smothered by the smoke and heat. Oddly, there was only a sense of calm at finding her, a feeling of sad closure._

_The temptation was there to lay her back on the bed and let the flames take her, but Methos had promised her a home and a name, and his protection while he lived. He couldn't abandon her now. Tenderly, he brushed back the dark curls from her face and gathered her to him, carrying her from the house as he had carried her into it two years previous. He never noticed the tears leaving pale tracks down his soot-blackened face._

* * *

_Shortly afterward, the engine companies and volunteers pulled out, and the city was abandoned to the fire. Later that day, thousands wandered aimlessly among the smoldering ruins, weeping and cursing, salvaging what they could. Methos made no attempt to save anything. Nothing could be saved; it was a lesson driven home to him again and again. Stopping only to make arrangements for Elinore, he walked out of town much the same way he had come in, empty-handed and alone._

_Behind him, as the sun slipped behind the Virginia Range, a strong west wind picked up and transformed the city into a featureless sea of blowing ash, quietly echoing with the cries of the homeless._

* * *

When he came out of the past, he found that he was driving along a steep, winding road. It took him a moment to recognize the Geiger Grade, to realize that he was headed back towards Virginia City. Until this trip, he'd not been back since the fire. There'd been no point; the only thing left that he'd recognize would be the mine dumps and foundation scars. Nothing left but scars. There had been nothing worth taking, and he'd left nothing behind. Nothing but bittersweet memories of a fragile, broken woman who hadn't wanted what he had to offer, only the one thing he couldn't give her. He'd never figured out whether her death was an accident, or not. He wasn't sure it mattered; either way, all that was left was the sense of failure, one that was settling around him again like a heavy weight.

He saw a herd of wild horses and slowed, admiring their rough beauty. He'd heard their numbers were growing, that they'd settled in around the edges of Reno, sometimes traveling through the communities at the edges of town. It always heartened him to see that something stayed wild. Sometimes he felt as if his whole life had been a process of watching the world be tamed, step by step, watching wild things be domesticated for the amusement and pleasure of the human race. Now there was an odd reversal happening, people working to restore predators hunted almost to extinction, land bought up to keep it from being stripped in the name of productivity. Now wildness was encouraged for people's amusement and entertainment.

A car behind him honked impatiently, and he sped up, his mind reverting to his last sight of Elinore, frail and small in the makeshift funeral home. He didn't know if he'd done well by her, leaving her to the care of strangers, but he didn't think it would have mattered to her. She'd been at peace, finally, in a way he never could have made her. He'd left, burdened only with a sense of having failed her, but that burden had noticeably lifted the further he'd gotten from Virginia City, in distance and time. He'd had a lot of practice outliving guilt and despair. Nothing too bad that you couldn't outlive it. Duncan would figure that out, too, realize that sometimes the only way to take care of things was to leave them behind, let time fill in the emptiness that words never could.

And if you waited long enough, even the scars went away.

* * *

Reno Blues Festival Rancho  
San Rafael Park  
Reno, Nevada

Duncan got to the festival just as it opened to the public, forcing him to greater lengths of patience, reason, and understanding than he had to spare just now. The self-important guard on the employee's gate refused to listen to his claims of working with Joe, or of being a personal friend, roadie, accountant, antique dealer, masseur, or gigolo of any of the other musicians that he could think of off hand, and he wouldn't send anyone to ask. So Duncan waited in line while his tension ratcheted higher and higher, the muted murmuring of the crowd scraping on his nerves like sandpaper. Now inside, he swept through the maze of tents and stages, stretching his perception for any tingle of Immortal presence.

He wasn't sure why he bothered, he knew Methos was gone. Vanished in the night like so many times before, except, like the last time, Methos had left no clue as to where he'd be, and this time Duncan had shown him the door personally. And he wasn't even sure why he wanted him back, given how nasty things had gotten. Unfortunately, he loved the bastard, and he couldn't help but think that the feeling was returned. And misery loves company. Sometime last night or this morning he recognized that Methos was in as much pain and confusion as he was, and if he had a chance, he was determined to try and work it out. And although there was no point in hoping that Methos would be here, blithely twisting cables and tuning guitars for Joe, it was all he had left. At least he finally felt like he was doing something instead of sitting back passively while events unfolded around him.

Ralph and Eddie Parker were already playing a set on the main stage, the low, smoky sound of piano and trombone more appropriate to dimly lit clubs and expensive bourbon than diet colas and a grassy field in the Reno sunshine. He didn't pause to listen as he cut through the vendors toward the second stage.

There was still no sign of Methos, or Joe, just an amplified Celtic band outfitted in Renaissance Faire versions of Highland dress. His head spun with the surrealism of an electric bass and a traditional bodhran driving a power version of an old Irish jig. The music was good, but what were these guys doing at a blues festival? He shook his head and continued on his way, scanning the crowds and the booths, hoping to see someone he recognized, see if anyone had seen Methos. His eye caught that of a busty girl in a green bodice, and she smiled at him from behind a vendor table covered in T-shirts and cassettes. He flashed a friendly smile back, but kept moving.

Realizing that he'd covered most of the grounds by now, he stopped in front of an Egyptian art booth, which oddly enough was immediately next to a beer truck. Damn Methos anyway! If he lived to be a thousand he'd never be able to look at beer, or book stores, or almost anything ever again without thinking of his...//Lover? Are we still lovers? Are we even friends?// He hated this feeling, this limbo in which they seemed perpetually stuck, neither blessed nor damned. Couldn't move forward, can't go back...

Lost in his own dismal thoughts, he was rocked by the impact as someone crashed into him from behind. He started to turn, taking a breath to offer assistance, or apology, if necessary, expelling it harshly as a sharp boot connected forcefully with his shin. "Hey!"

"God damn it! Can't you fucking tourists watch where you're going? Just stand there like a friggin' tree, with about as much brainpower, in the middle of the walk. Open your eyes once in a while, for Christ's sake, and get the Hell off the path if you gotta rubberneck! Shit!"

"Vanessa?" He looked down at the mouthy redhead.

"Mac!!" Again the compact body was launched at him, strong arms latching around his waist in a greeting as enthused as the cursing had been. His arms came around her more to keep his balance than from any expression of affection.

"Hey, there." Impatient for her to complete whatever private ritual demanded the curses and the hugs, he pried her off of him. "Have you seen Joe? Or Adam?"

"Nah," she waggled the ever-present bass guitar case at him, smiling. "Joe won't be in 'til later. I sat in with Dave and the guys earlier."

"The gates just opened."

"Yeah, come on." She grabbed his hand and dragged him almost-unresisting through the growing crowd. "We gotta talk."

"Have you seen Adam?"

"That's what we gotta talk about."

"What--?"

"Hold that thought, gorgeous."

After a few minutes he gave up struggling and trying to get any more out of her, content to see where she would take him. He already knew he wouldn't find what he was looking for here, and he'd learned quickly not to stand between Vanessa and her goal, mostly from stories the rest of the band told. He watched in bemusement as she parted the crowd in front of them with an array of curses and calculated swings of her bass, reminding him of a pilot boat in a busy harbor, guiding tankers out to sea. Red curls flounced in the wind, and her short, stocky legs ate up the ground faster than he would have thought possible. Too soon she pulled him past the stubborn gate-guard and up a seedy looking side street adjacent to the sprawling park and nearby university. At the peeling, green-painted door of a tiny pub she finally drew a halt to the forced march, turning to regard him with a curious gaze.

"You got money?"

He nodded, confused. "Yes, but why...?"

"Good. C'mon." The unruly curls bounced again in a satisfied nod, and she dragged him forward into the smoke-filled darkness.

It was like stepping back in time to bars decades gone, except that the lights were electric and the music was canned, Country 'n Western wailing loudly over the speakers. The air was heavy with smoke and the scent of alcohol, an aroma that had to permeate the walls since it was far too heavy to have been produced by the few patrons scattered about at this early hour.

"Hey, Mickey!" Vanessa bellowed in a voice Duncan had never heard before, surely an unexpected by-product of years of vocal training. "Gimme a couple drinks!"

Mickey looked up from behind the bar. Fat and sallow from too many hours indoors, he looked haggard and weary, as if he'd been here all night pouring liquor for indifferent customers. "Sure, Nessie. You want the usual?"

"No..." She stole an appraising glance at Duncan, then swept a look around the room and pointed at a back table with a certainty worthy of a golden retriever. "Sit."

Mickey made a low noise of protest. "Hey, don't you want to sit at the bar?"

"What, and stare at your homely mug all day?" Vanessa leaned over the scarred surface of the bar. "Let me have that one, third from the left."

"Glasses?"

"Yes, glasses, ya moron. Two. This ain't the back country. And ice. Hey, and give me a beer."

"What kind?"

"The cold kind." The requested order was produced on a tray that had clearly seen better days, and she turned, looking flatly at Duncan. "You aren't sitting."

He looked sharply at Vanessa and her sudden transformation. He'd never spent much time with her apart from the band, or at Joe's, and now he realized why -- she frightened him, and he was suddenly, shamefully glad that she wasn't a pre-Immortal. She gestured at him again, and since he really couldn't think of a reason not to obey, he led the way to the indicated table, far to the back and bathed in the jaundiced light of a beer sign, thinking that "Nessie" was perhaps not as inappropriate a nickname as he'd first thought.

Seated to her satisfaction, she poured for him from the bottle of dark liquor and swigged from her own beer. Duncan refused to look at the label on the poison-on-the-rocks she was pushing toward him.

When she didn't immediately volunteer any more information, he decided to venture a question. "Vanessa, what are we doing here?"

"We're drinking," she said, like he was asking her what year it was, or what color the sky might be.

"Well, yes, but...why?"

"Why not?"

He sighed and sipped at the glass in front of him. Ugh. This stuff could be used to soak rust off a radiator. Oh, well. Not like it would kill him. He drank more. Maybe a change of subject would work. "Have you seen Adam?"

An unenthused nod. "Yeah, tall guy, dark hair, nice nose." She drank more beer.

Duncan liked Vanessa, really. Joe liked her. She had a voice that gave new meaning to all sorts of words used to describe blues singers, like 'rich' and 'smoky' and 'smooth,' a voice that was easily three times too big for her short, stocky body. It would be A Bad Thing to kill her in a fit of frustration. Joe would be upset.

"No...Well, yes, but have you seen him lately? Since yesterday afternoon? You said we needed to talk about him."

"Yeah."

"Yeah, you've seen him? Or yeah, we need to talk about him?"

"Both." She smiled at him benignly when he growled, reminding him of a badger he'd once cornered. The badger hadn't looked intimidated, either.

He wanted to bang his head on the table. Actually, he wanted to bang her head on the table. Instead, he drank more of the foul, brown-colored paint thinner masquerading as whisky. "Where? When?"

She looked at him over the wet rim of her beer mug. "You should get out more, Mac. You look like you're about to bust an aneurysm over the Jolly Green Giant there."

Not completely understanding her reference, he let it go without comment.

Thirty seconds later, Vanessa was still silently drinking beer in the sickly yellow light, and he'd exceeded his limit of patience. "So, what does that make me, Little Sprout?"

She looked at him like he'd grown horns. "No, that makes you Gawain."

There was really nothing he could say to that. He sipped at his flavored turpentine and decided to ignore the fact that she was quite mad. "You said you saw him?"

"Saw who?"

"Adam."

"Yeah."

He ground his teeth, praying fervently. //Dear God, give me patience and give it _now_.// "Where?"

"He was at Circus Circus with Dave. Last I saw him he was face down in a shot glass, trying to pull the bottle in after him. Gotta tell ya, you're a better man than I am to put up with that." She reached over to refill his tumbler.

"His drinking? He..."

She waved a tiny hand, cutting off his explanation. "No, we all drink like dehydrated guppies. Part of the union by-laws, y'know. Smoking is optional. I mean the performance."

"Performance?"

"Pure Shakespeare. I mean, it was that good. Not too dramatic, but very, very memorable. What I could understand of it. Very passionate." She paused thoughtfully. "Must be a helluva lay."

He groaned inwardly, reviewing last night's argument and speculating on the content of Methos' oration. "There are compensations," he offered blandly.

"There'd have to be." She drained her mug and got up, heading to the bar to pester Mickey for another.

In the meantime, he continued drinking the potent brown liquor, trying not to think about it too much. It really wasn't so bad once he got over the way it stripped the feeling off of his tongue. He drew his finger through the condensation on the scarred table, trying to recall what he knew of Gawain, wondering what Vanessa had meant and afraid to ask. He was pretty sure he wouldn't like it. His ruminations were interrupted as Vanessa returned triumphantly with her beer.

"Y'know, I never woulda figured you for being gay."

"I'm not gay," he replied automatically.

She blinked at him. "Call it what you want, but going by Adam's personal overshares last night, you two are _real_ close. And frankly, I don't get it. Don't get me wrong, I like Adam fine, but I like a lot of people. Doesn't mean I'd sleep with them."

He smiled. "It's complicated."

She snorted indelicately. "That's kinda obvious. Let's review. Adam's kinda snarky, drinks like a fish, bitches loudly and extensively about you and your relationship in public venues..."

"Wait... What?"

"Aren't you listening? Keep up, man. He gave a ninety-minute dissertation about you personally, your shortcomings as a partner and general human being, to anyone who had the time to listen. He can't seem to decide if he worships you like a pagan god, or hates you for leading him around like a blue-ribbon show dog."

The close air of the bar was suddenly cold and heavy. He tossed back the contents of his glass in a single gulp. "He said he hated me?"

"Get a fucking clue! That's the least of what he said. Shake him off, Mac." She was nearly shouting in her urgency to make a point, the yellow light bleaching her face and hair to an unwholesome pallor.

He shook his head. "I don't want to lose him."

"Then you got a real wide streak of self-abuse. Never figured you for that, either. Maybe my radar's bent, but you can do better."

"I don't think so." The music had changed in the background, something mournful and angry all at once. "You don't really know him."

She pulled at her beer again, tight with resignation. "Fine, have it your way, Prince Darning. He treats you like shit, and you keep going back for seconds."

"Prince Darning?" Another reference he didn't quite grasp.

"Yeah, always putting it back together. Just think about it. You two are like night and day, right down to your shoes. I can't even start on that one. You're both miserable, Adam has some serious problems all on his lonesome, he disses you in public, and you're not even gay. Yeah, I can see why you're together. Sure. Do both of you a favor, Mac, and lose him. Cause I can tell you this: he never will."

The ice in his glass clinked faintly as he drained off the last of the liquor and water in the bottom. "I wish I shared your optimism."

Vanessa rolled her eyes. "You're hopeless, you know that? Okay, just one more bit of advice: ask him who Elinore is. She played pretty heavily in his trip down relationship lane last night, too, and I'd say that's someone he's got some unresolved feelings for."

Duncan looked at her, seeing her genuine compassion, and it settled like salt in the new wounds she'd ripped. "I appreciate the advice." He pushed back from the table. "Thanks for the drink, Vanessa. See you later." On the way out, he tossed a bill on the bar, nodding to Mickey.

Outside, the bright summer sun made his eyes water, and he tried not to think about what Vanessa had said as he walked down the street. Tried not to wonder if she was right. Then he remembered the pain in Methos' eyes, the words they'd both spoken with intent to wound, and he knew she wasn't. If he could find him, he wouldn't let Methos drive him away anymore, no matter what he did. And surely Methos would at least let Joe know where he was going.

* * *

Distances in Nevada aren't like those in other parts of the world, as if the Silver State quietly rewrote the laws of nature to suit itself, simply ignoring or altering those that didn't fit its personal vision of The Way Things Should Be. The miles of highway between the Blues Festival and Boulder Cove evaporated under the wheels of Duncan's rented car, disappearing in a vision of evergreens and steep mountains as he anticipated the first glimpse of Tahoe through the trees.

It had been too long since he'd been back here, breathing the serenity of the earth and sky, the trees and stones and water. Restored, Tahoe was almost fey, a bit of paradise fallen to earth -- as long as paradise included casinos on South Shore and tourists all along the eastern rim. Fool that he was, he'd wanted to make some memories with Methos in this place where ancient and modern melded, envisioning music and fun and nothing but pleasure. He'd rented the cabin for a month, hoping that the extended break would give them time to work out whatever it was that was happening between them.

//Idiot,// he accused himself for the hundredth time as the car found the cabin seemingly on its own. Well, there was no reason he couldn't just stay here till the month ran out, swimming and gaming, visiting the area museums and ghost towns. He could go to concerts and shows. Hell, Jerry Thomas might even still be tending bar up at the Delta in Virginia City. There was plenty to keep him occupied, give him time to plan what he'd say to Methos when he saw him. If he saw him. He felt that grief again, but put it away. He wasn't ready yet to start mourning.

Far out across the water a bird cried out once, the sound ringing eerily off the naked rock.

He gathered his light jacket and a shopping bag that had been left in the car overnight. It was still early, the sun barely brushing the tops of the Sierras on the Western shore. There was more than enough time to make plans for the evening, to get dinner, go to a show. He could probably even go back to the cafe and see if that nice waitress was busy. //Uh-huh, and I'm sure she'll be happy to drop her plans on a Saturday night to come keep me company, the man who took half an hour to order pancakes.// He could almost hear her, _Of course, just let me call my husband and mother and seven children._

The door was unlocked.

Preternaturally calm, every sense stretched, he stepped inside, dropping his bag and jacket to the side just as the sweep of presence pulled at him. The katana came to hand without thought, and he moved clear of the doorway, waiting.

Methos stepped out of the bedroom, large and silent, his broadsword gripped with deceptive casualness. Duncan felt an overwhelming relief at the sight of him. The angular face was flat and unemotional, except for the hazel eyes regarding Duncan with a wild look that he'd only seen once before -- when Methos had him pressed up against the wall the night before. He might have been a stranger for all the recognition Duncan saw in him. Nothing about him looked familiar, nothing looked safe, and yet Duncan felt a surge of arousal, a feeling of near awe, a desire to lose himself in Methos' fierceness.

And God, he was beautiful. Duncan drank in the sight of him, relaxing his stance, realizing exactly how sure he'd been he'd never see him again. Tall and broad, a green silk shirt Duncan had given him draping loosely across his wide shoulders, moving faintly with every breath. Was it a good sign that he was wearing the shirt?

Veins and muscles in his forearm stood out, twitching as he adjusted his grip on the sword. Gracefully balanced on bare feet, he was a vision of lethal power. This wasn't some out-of-practice player, willing to give his life up to the better man. Had Duncan ever seen this man before? Had Methos let him? He had a sense of being lost in Methos' vast experience...and he wanted it, wanted to give in to him, to feel small and young, and out of control. To break Methos' control.

They stood that way for a long moment, appraising each other in a way that made Duncan's mouth hot and the fine hairs on his neck stand up. He felt his lips trying to pull away from his teeth in an instinctive snarl, the confrontation of predators. The old question hung in the air, almost audible. How good was Methos? If, at the last, it came down to just them, who would win? Could he do it? Could Methos? Maybe the damnable Game would finally resolve things one way or the other. He felt a twist of an icy knife in his gut at the thought. Too many questions and no answers.

Methos' grip on the broadsword was minutely adjusted again, and the cold eyes flicked down and up, a gaze so potent that it was almost tangible, sending a flood of heat through Duncan, followed by a sharp chill. "For me? Really, you shouldn't have." The tone was flat and serious, a cold mockery of the light words.

There was a pause, a single breath of pure confusion, as Duncan wondered if he'd spoken aloud, Methos' words echoing his own dark thoughts too closely. "What? God, no!" He flipped the katana out of the ready position he was holding it in and up behind his arm. "You startled me, that's all. I didn't expect you back."

Methos twisted his lips at him in a parody of a smile and slackened his grip on his sword as he shifted back toward the bedroom. "Don't worry, I've just come back for my things. I'll be out of your way soon enough."

Duncan felt a terrible emptiness welling up, reminding him of his earlier feeling that Methos was dead to him, gone as if he'd never existed. "Don't go."

Methos turned back to look at him. "What?"

"I don't want you to go. We need to talk."

"Seems to me we've already had this discussion. This isn't working, MacLeod. I thought we decided that last night. You do remember?"

Heat rose to his face at the memory, but whether it was arousal, shame, or anger that colored his cheeks, he didn't know. Truthfully, there wasn't much in him left to care. "I remember. And I still don't want you to go," he repeated, clinging to the spare expression of that one overwhelming need. "I need you to stay." He knew it was time for him to stand firm under the oncoming blow. Whatever problems they had, they could work them out. Better this than nothing at all, which was the only alternative; he could see that, now. They'd come too far to go back.

Methos whirled on him angrily, flinging his sword to the floor with a muted clang. "No! What you want is to not be alone! You want to play some version of the white knight, but I'm not cut out to be your damsel in distress. I can't give you that, and frankly, I'm tired of trying."

"Methos, I've spent a good portion of my life alone! I like company, yes, but the longest I've ever stayed with anyone is with Tessa." Duncan stalked further into the room. "I don't want to rescue you! I want to _be_ with you!"

"I can't do this anymore, Mac. I-- I can't put myself aside anymore."

"Well, who the hell asked you to? You think I want somebody else, somebody that's quiet and obedient and less trouble than a five-thousand-year-old asshole? What is it with you and this need to see yourself as some kind of camp follower, or good little wife, best seen and not heard? You think that's all I want you for? Someone to keep the home fires burning? Is that how I treat you?" He stalked off to toss his sword down on the table, leaning on it for support. "If that was all I needed, I could get it for a lot less trouble someplace else. Easy, you are not." He took a deep breath, trying to quench the flare of anger. "God, Methos, do you think that badly of me?" He turned his head to look at Methos.

As he watched, Methos seemed to shrink slightly, pull in on himself, withdrawing, and it undercut Duncan's anger. He stood a moved a few steps closer to him. "Why do you do that?"

"Do what?" Methos looked startled.

"Always make yourself seem smaller. Don't do that. Don't...don't be less than who you are with me, Methos. You don't need to hide from me that way."

"It's...easier."

"For you? Or for me? Do you think I'm that shallow?" He could see Methos' temper flare, and he found himself glad of it. "Or do you think you're that frightening? You make it too easy for me, maybe. Too easy to forget who you are. Is that what you want?"

Methos closed his eyes and rubbed the back of his neck, as if it was too tight, and his anger seemed to ebb again. "I don't know what I think, anymore, Duncan. I'm just tired of-- I can't exist only in terms of what you need. I'm not your student. I'm not your teacher, and I'm for sure not your goddamn trophy wife, to follow you docilely hither and yon. And like it or not, I'm not Adam, either. All or nothing, Mac. You don't get to pick and choose what parts of me to want anymore."

Duncan stepped closer and confronted him. "And what, exactly, is it you think I need you to be? What is it you think I can't handle? And where do you get off thinking you're the only one in this relationship that's having trouble adjusting? You don't exactly come across as being open and sharing. Maybe you need to stop picking and choosing what parts of yourself you show to me, anymore. I'm an adult, Methos, not a child."

Methos looked at him, startled. "You haven't proven yourself very willing to deal with some of the parts of me you've seen."

"Well, the feeling is mutual, Methos. We both have our illusions, don't we? I'm sorry if I can't quite assimilate things as fast as you'd like, but I think I've done a pretty good job."

Methos leaned back against the wall, his exceptional care betraying his brittle mood, his silence betraying nothing.

Duncan let the silence stand until he couldn't bear it any longer. He opened his mouth and surprised himself with what came out. "Who's Elinore?"

Methos' head snapped up almost audibly. "What?"

"Elinore." Duncan watched him closely, wanting to catch his reaction, uncertain what he hoped for.

Methos' eyes slammed shut and his face went blank, sweeping away the flash of pain there before Duncan was quite certain that he'd seen it. They opened again almost immediately, the new and improved expression betraying nothing but a bland bewilderment, although the tension in his shoulders betrayed a deeper sentiment. "Elinore? Where did you hear about Elinore?"

Anger and hurt flared, hiding the surge of guilt. After all this, Methos was back to concealing things. Duncan wondered who he was protecting. "Vanessa mentioned her."

Methos smiled at that. "Ah, Vanessa. She doesn't care for me very much, does she?"

Duncan smiled thinly. "No, she doesn't. Not much at all. Now, me, she likes."

A slow shake of his head back and forth, a bitter smile. "Don't worry, Mac. There's no one else. Elinore's been dead for more than a hundred and twenty years." There was a pause, as if what followed was harder to say, and when he spoke, his tone was bleak and lifeless. "She was my wife." Methos stared out the window. "She wanted more than I could give her, too."

"More than you can--?" Duncan's confusion deepened. "What is it you think I want that you can't give, Methos? How is it I ask too much of you, exactly? From where I stand, you're the one whose needs aren't being met." He ran a hand through his hair, his breathing ragged, feeling vulnerable at the admission. "It doesn't seem to me that this is about what I want, at all. What about what you want, because hell if I can figure it out!" he snapped in frustration. "I'm not allowed to keep you, I can't let you go--"

There was a short bark of sound that might have been mistaken for laughter on some other day, and Methos turned to fully face him, all confusion stripped away, leaving him curiously naked in his anger. "Let me go? Excuse me for mistaking this grand gesture for the foot in my ass that it feels like. You can't throw me out and then play the abandoned lover the next day! You don't get to play that game."

"Like hell! You'd decided to leave before I had anything to say about it! I think I _was_ the abandoned lover, if my memory serves me. Who went out and got himself laid?" He took a deep breath. "It seems to me that we've both been playing a lot of games, only we haven't been on the same field. So, what game are we playing this time? Tell me, Methos, because I'll do my best to learn the rules this time, if you'll play fair." Duncan could hear the desperation in his own voice, but he was past caring.

"No more games, Mac. This one's for keeps."

"Is that supposed to be some kind of joke? For keeps? You've had one foot toward the door the whole time we've been together."

"Jesus, MacLeod, I'm surprised you don't chain me to the bed at night. I live in your house, eating your food, on your schedule. I even wear the fucking clothes you give me. Pardon me for feeling a little kept!"

"Don't give me that crap. It's your home, too, in any way that matters. I'm sorry if you don't like the gifts I get for you. I'll stop. And if the living arrangements bother you, fine. That's easy enough to fix. I'll sell the barge and the loft, and we can find a place together, anywhere you'd like. We can get a joint checking account. Split the bills. I'll do the shopping, you clean the bathroom; I'll wash the clothes, and you can put them away. Hell, we can even get monogrammed towels, if it will make you feel more at home." He stopped for breath, running a hand through his hair in a tight gesture. "Anything you want, Methos. I mean it."

"It's not that easy, Duncan. "

Duncan wondered if he looked as bewildered as he felt. "So that's it? You just go? Tidy little solution you've got there, and it applies to so many things. Were you the one that coined the phrase? 'When the going gets tough...'"

Methos glared at him, his eyes as cold and hard as agates. "I don't need this."

"Then tell me what you do need! You know, I'm not exactly new at this relationship thing. Tessa and I had a good one, and I don't think she ever felt like she was nothing but a prize poodle. And I don't think I treat you like one, either! I'm sorry if I failed to realize that you're such a shy and retiring person that you're incapable of expressing your needs."

"That's not fair, Mac!"

"Isn't it? Somehow, sometime, you've decided that being a part of my life, letting me be a part of your life, is a one-way street, and you're stuck at a dead end. You don't want to be with me? Fine! Go, leave, lead your own life the way you want to live it, in glorious solitude. But don't blame me because you can't figure out what you want. Or if you can't be happy with what we have." He took a deep breath. "Or if I'm not enough for you."

"Duncan, it's not-"

Duncan interrupted him. "What are you so afraid of?"

"I'm not--"

"Don't lie to me. You don't want to talk about it, fine. I'll talk. You want to know what I'm afraid of?" Duncan sucked an unsatisfying breath of air and gripped his courage with both hands before continuing. "I know that there is nothing I can do, nothing you'll let me do, to make up for the differences between us. Whatever your reasons were for coming back to Paris and agreeing to stay with me, I'm afraid that it won't be enough for you in the long run. That I won't be enough to keep you interested." Duncan stopped to see if this was having any affect on Methos, but the most he could see was that he still had his attention.

"I'm not stupid, Methos, I've felt you drifting away, and nothing I do seems to matter. I am terrified, every single day, that you'll leave, and I'll never see you again. That the next I'll hear of you is a midnight phone call from Joe, telling me that someone's taken your head."

The silence was overwhelming, making the sound of his own heart seem like thunder in his ears. Methos just stared at him with that damned blank expression that could mean anything from pity to rage. It didn't matter. Nothing really mattered. Duncan surrendered the field to his opponent and paced numbly through the living area, leaning heavily against the back of a chair to look out the window at the sharp sweep of the mountains, back-lit by the dying sun. Behind him he heard the ghost of bare feet over carpet as Methos moved, and he braced himself for the slam of the bedroom door. The dull thump of a body against the sofa cushions made his heart pound anew.

But Methos said nothing.

The silence was tight and uncomfortable between them. It lay heavily in the air like a tangible barrier, an unbreachable wall. Methos' presence, his utter nearness, coupled with that sense of uncrossable distance, was its own special torment. The room was filled with questions, accusations, desires...the dreadful urge to say something, anything, to break the thick, melancholy spell of the quiet, and the absolute fear that almost anything said at this point would be the wrong thing.

That Methos had remained this long was a kind of victory in itself, but just now, in the potent silence of the darkening room, the victory tasted like ashes.

The sun fell behind the Sierras with a brief splash of rose and violet before the sky settled easily into the more somber colors of twilight: soft blues and grays and blacks, highlighted by the diamond-bright gleam of early stars and the lights on the far shore of the lake. The sound of crickets carried faintly through the open window, and Methos shifted on the sofa with a dry sound of cloth-on-cloth, but still didn't speak. Perhaps there was nothing left to say.

Duncan swallowed tightly, trying to moisten his mouth. He faced the large windows, watching the day's descent into darkness with a sinking heart. He didn't need to look behind him to know that Methos was still there, watching him. The sensation of that gaze on his back was as potent as the low throb of Immortal presence that permeated the room. He drew a slow breath of the heavy air. "Can I get you a beer?"

"No, thank you," Methos replied quietly.

There was no place here to find purchase, nowhere to hold on as the words slid down into the consuming silence, but Duncan took another breath and tried again. "Are you hungry?"

"No, Mac, I'm not hungry." A dry, tired rasp of breath slipped almost unnoticed into the quiet. "Am I a guest now?"

"No. I just...I feel like I should do something."

"Then by all means, do something."

A wave of deep frustration rolled through Duncan. He ground his teeth at the force of it, biting back the sharp words that readied themselves on his tongue. There was a sense of being on the verge of something wonderful, or terrible, or both. He steadied his breath and went and grabbed himself a beer, nearly draining it with the first drink, hoping it would bolster his courage to get through this to whatever was on the other side.

Tension coiled through his back and shoulders, calling for motion, physical action to ease the pressure of the moment. Instead, he turned and leaned heavily on the back of the chair, digging his fingers into the soft upholstery, watching the man on the couch. Methos had abandoned his typical boneless sprawl in favor of a wary perch on the edge of the cushion, the bright eyes regarding him with cold attention. Taking a deep breath, Duncan ground out the words like broken glass, "Why did you come back to Paris?"

Methos looked at him curiously, and Duncan wondered what was going on in that inexplicable head of his.

"You want to know why I came back, or why I stayed?"

"Either. Both. Why are you here, Methos? Why are you with me at all? Because it sure doesn't seem to make you happy."

Methos clasped his hands in front of him and looked down at them. Duncan felt a sudden relief as that bright regard was removed. "Why do you think?"

"I have no idea. I'd like to think it was maybe because you missed me." Duncan took another swallow of his beer. "Did you?"

"You have no idea."

Duncan felt a warmth bloom low in his belly at the intensity of Methos' tone, a warmth that was intensified by the look in Methos' eyes when he looked back up. He suddenly felt a little unsteady, and he didn't think it was the beer. He put down his bottle, bracing himself on the chair. "Vanessa said you said you hated me, sometimes."

Methos smiled slightly. "I seem to have had made quite a fool of myself last night."

"Yeah, I heard. Is that a good sign?"

"Maybe. Duncan?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you really think you have so little to offer me?"

This time, Duncan was the one who looked away. He shrugged, not trusting his voice. "Sometimes." The word was ragged, proving him right.

"Surely you have more respect for me that that?"

Duncan looked up, bewildered.

"You really think I'd waste so much time on someone I didn't think was worth it?"

"I figured I had good amusement value." He couldn't keep the faint bitterness from his voice.

Methos' smile was wiped off his face. "Now, that hurt."

"More than if I'd said I felt like a prized pet?"

Methos stared at him for a few moments. "We're quite a pair, aren't we?"

"At this point, I'm not sure what we are. Do you hate me sometimes?"

Methos sighed. "Sometimes, yes. But no more than I hate myself. Because, despite myself, I can't seem to stay away from you, no matter how badly it seems to work for us both." He rubbed wearily at his eyes, his shoulders shuddering once in what might have been a silent laugh. "And it's not you, Mac. It's me. I know this will never work, but hope fucking springs eternal."

"Then why are you doing this? If you want out so badly, I won't stop you, but--" Duncan recoiled and took a step as Methos surged up, his eyes flashing, as if he were unable to sit still any longer, stalking around the chair to confront him, the fierce intensity of his low, even tones piercing Duncan's heart with a painful joy.

"I don't want out. I _never_ wanted out. That's the punchline of a very sad joke. You really want to know what I'm afraid of? I am _losing myself_ in you, and it may kill me, and I still don't want out. But it feels as if you hold me at arm's length."

It was the naked hurt in Methos voice as much as the unshielded clarity of his eyes that swept the ground from under Duncan's feet. To hear that admission, to know that Methos, with all his years, all his experience, was as lost and scared as Duncan himself. He realized how much his reactions to Methos' past hurt, as if he was rejecting Methos himself, and he wanted to try and take that pain away.

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"I-- It's not that simple, Mac..." Methos sighed, even as he leaned his head back, accepting the soft kisses Duncan brushed along his cheek and jaw.

"Yeah, you've said that, but I think it can be. Just say it. Tell me what you need. Tell me what you're looking for. Because I can tell you what I need, Methos. I need you. I don't want you to leave, but you're right, we can't go on like this, either."

"What? Tired of fighting-as-foreplay already?"

Duncan silenced him with a kiss that left them both breathless. "Yes. Aren't you? And quit trying to change the subject. I won't hurt you."

"Won't you?"

With those words, Duncan flashed on his dream, on Methos, battered and bruised, and he pulled back, though he kept his hand against Methos' throat. "I don't...I don't want to hurt you."

"Well, that counts for something." Methos opened his eyes fully and looked at him. "But we all hurt each other, Duncan. That's life." His gaze faded slightly. "Sometimes I have trouble remembering that."

Duncan pushed aside his fear and reached out, as much from the need to touch Methos as the real belief that he might fall without support. And Methos was there, strong enough to support him, to hold him and all of his insecurities without wavering, without flinching. For a long moment it was all he could do to stare into the unfathomed depths of those familiar eyes, dizzy with the vertigo of seeing so much. So much loneliness, so much understanding, so much human need.

"I thought--" What had he thought? If anyone was lost it was Duncan, uncertain of where to begin, what to give, where to find a solid place to hold on. He realized that in his own need to protect himself from Methos' expected departure, he'd confused and hurt his lover badly. He'd resisted making himself too vulnerable, too open, and managed to drive them apart. It was time to change that. "I thought you were holding back from me. I didn't realize--" He took a deep breath. "I never meant to hurt you. You were just so much more than I realized..."

Methos' hands were big and warm on his arms, steadying him with a strength he'd never really believed was there, despite being shown time and again. He leaned into that strength and fought the urge to close his eyes, reaching for what was being offered, understanding the risk. He'd forgotten that love without risk wasn't love at all. So, maybe it wouldn't work out, but maybe it would.

"I know, Duncan." Methos leaned in close, holding him, pressing their heads together, whispering, "I'm sorry. I didn't trust you, I guess. Or maybe I didn't trust me. I didn't know whether you'd be able to handle it, or not, after Kronos, after Seireadan -- whether you wanted to know." Methos pressed his mouth to Duncan's neck, and Duncan could hear the plea in his voice. "I can see it now, but I never knew you felt overwhelmed. I thought you were pushing me away, no matter what I did, so I just made it easy for you."

Pushing him away? It took all the strength left in Duncan's arms to pull Methos closer, craving the feel of him, desperate for his warmth, suddenly unable to tolerate any space between them at all. "I-- I didn't know. I didn't realize--" He shook his head, having no further answer, even though he knew Methos couldn't see him. "And what do we do then?" he whispered.

"Well...some of us try and keep it from hurting by holding back."

"That's us, then. Tried that, don't like it. Next option?" He stroked lightly along the nape of Methos' neck.

"I suppose...we can try living with it. Through it. I'm not sure I remember how. I'm too used to living past it. Mortal time makes it easier."

"Together?" Duncan's voice was rough. "Somehow?"

"I'd like that." Methos' voice was equally rough and intimate.

With that admission, their openness, their vulnerability complete, words were too dangerous. Duncan didn't know which of them started it, who moved first, but he didn't care. Needing to remove the distance that had come between them, they met in a kiss driven equally by relief and passion. Their arms moved to hold tight, their lips and tongues trying to reestablish an intimacy that had been lost before it was securely anchored. Breathing was secondary to the harsh demand of that kiss, the desperate, wet feeding of desire and soothing of fear.

And still Methos held tight to him, all solid strength. It felt so good, to have someone to lean on, and Duncan felt something give inside, some last hesitation, a peevish reluctance that muttered faintly and was gone. It seemed a lifetime ago that he had pleaded with Methos to let this odd relationship be about the moment, not about the end. But then Duncan himself had been the one to brace and guard against the anticipated ending, every joy they shared colored by a premonition of doom -- a prophecy they'd nearly brought to fruition as Methos let Duncan's self-defensiveness drive them further and further apart.

He shuddered as Methos rubbed against him, insistent, urgent, as if trying to burn away the angry words and distance in a fiery closeness. Feeling him, the hardness of him, his desire, there was the old tickle of fear at the base of Duncan's spine, a fear of getting too close, and he acknowledged it, embracing it. He was afraid, trembling, his heart hammering in a way that it hadn't since that first unexpected night in Seacouver. But his fear hadn't stopped him then, and he wouldn't let it stop him now. Finally he acknowledged that it wasn't about Methos -- he had never feared Methos, or anything Methos could do to him. He had feared himself and his own ability to satisfy, to be enough.

"I want you." The words were spoken before he'd realized his intent to say them, and whatever reactions he might have expected, Methos' sudden stillness wasn't numbered among them. Methos pulled back and looked at him, and Duncan felt laid open, spread bare under that piercing gaze. Then those warm hands reached for him, cradling his head, stroking and soothing as Methos guided the next kiss, and the next, his hunger obvious and demanding until Duncan was shaking with anticipation and need.

"All right," Methos said quietly, drawing him toward the bedroom. "I think I can deal with that." His smile was devilish, and it made Duncan's toes curl. "Come on."

* * *

Methos felt like his whole body was humming, with desire, with undiffused tension, with uncertainty -- with blissful relief. He'd been walking a knife's edge since he'd seen Duncan in the doorway with his sword raised, his face so stern and earnest. He'd wondered if that would be one of his last images of the man, since he didn't think he could handle being near him anytime soon if things completely fell apart. It had seemed fitting, somehow, that the tension that had always been between them should finally erupt into something lethal. This, even while the rational, unromantic part of his brain was acidly commenting that it was unlikely that Mac was after his head.

And now the knife had sliced open their unspoken wounds, allowing the resentment and bitterness to start to drain like so much pus, hopefully leaving the flesh healthy and able to heal. Even if it left scars. There were always scars, but sometimes they made things more interesting. He knew that nothing was solved, nothing was really changed. All the sincere words in the world couldn't make the changes, but they could open eyes that had been too fond of their narrow perceptions. Looking at Mac now, he could still see the uncertainty, the hesitation that was so out of place in this strong, secure man. It wounded him anew, that his selfishness had been the source of so much pain, even while he knew that they'd both been blind. But it humbled him to realize that even with those fears, Duncan had made a conscious choice to make that first step, to open himself up when he wasn't sure what the response would be. Methos didn't know if he'd have had the courage.

Maybe sometimes he was the student, after all. He stopped, and one after the other he raised Duncan's hands to his lips, pressing warm kisses on the knuckles.

"What is it?"

Methos smiled at him. "Nothing. I just wanted to." When Mac tried to pull him closer, he resisted, then smiled more wickedly.

"What?" Mac sounded decidedly more nervous.

They had moved into the bedroom now, and Methos felt very vulnerable, his normal emotional controls not cooperating. As he let himself feel it, his hunger alarmed him a little, the ferocity of it taking him by surprise. He wanted to indulge it, to feed it, but he didn't want to push Duncan too far, cause more damage than was already between them. He wasn't sure how much of Duncan's attitude was a reaction to his fear that Methos would leave, and he didn't want that.

The room was quiet, except for the sounds of their breathing, and the silence was deafening, overwhelming, a living thing surrounding them with its vibrancy, heightening everything. It was the kind of absolute quiet that filled up a room until the very air sang from the intensity of it. This was the hush of breathless waiting, the calm after a cleansing storm. The silence that comes when all the words are said.

Thinking over what was said, remembering Mac's fears of being overwhelmed, Methos let go of Duncan's hands and was startled by a glimmer of disappointment on his face. "What do you want, Duncan?"

Duncan laughed raggedly. "What do I want? I want you, your passion, your aggression, your hunger...don't hold back for my sake. Oh, I want this, Methos. So badly it scares me. And I'm not fragile. I won't break."

Methos shuddered, the words touching some deep part of him. He studied Duncan's face intently, silently, looking for any reluctance, and he could almost feel the tension building. After so long, he wanted to savor this, Duncan's submission, his voluntary relinquishing of control.

"My choice? My game, my rules?" He kept his voice low and husky.

Duncan swallowed and nodded mutely. Methos could see arousal and hesitation warring in him, and he could almost pick out the moment that arousal won.

He stepped close, sliding his hands to curve around the back of Duncan's head, kissing him briefly, but fiercely, and stepping back. "Then take off your clothes."

There was no hesitation on Duncan's part, but his fingers fumbled with the buttons anyway. Methos didn't move to help, just watched. It was no strip tease, there wasn't even anything particularly elegant in Duncan's movements, but there was a familiarity and ease to it that was as arousing as the most titillating display. When he was done, his clothes strewn on the floor, he just stood there, flexing his hands, shifting his weight, somewhere between nervousness and eagerness.

Methos stroked his fingers along Duncan's throat to his shoulder, then stroked his palm down over the curve of his chest. "Now mine."

Unlike the morning before, Duncan made no teasing moves, but his breathing roughened as he obeyed. Again, Methos stood passively, moving only when necessary. When they both stood naked, he pulled Duncan in for another kiss, a softer, but no less hungry one, and pulled back. "Turn around."

He stroked his hands from Duncan's waist up the broad back, savoring the feel of powerful muscles, then cupped them up over his shoulders, stepping close behind him, pressing his body against Duncan's, sliding his erection along the curves of his ass. He closed his eyes, feeling the heat between them, then pressed his lips to the smooth shoulder softly, almost reverently. Then he began to run his hands slowly over Duncan's body, possessively, tracing each curve of muscle, his movements strong and sure, his head tucked against Duncan's so that his breath stirred the hair on Duncan's temple. He kept his eyes closed, breathing in the scent of him, listening to him, feeling his body shift and tremble under Methos' hands.

He knew the maddening feel of such a slow exploration when you were expecting something harder and faster. He knew the pleasure of it, and he wanted to make this good. He bent his head to lick along Duncan's throat, then bite along the curve, softly, but always with enough pressure to make them both aware of what he could do. Over and over the same curve of skin he kissed and bit and licked, his hands continuing their slow ownership over chest and belly and thighs, cupping and fondling between his legs, but never with enough motion, enough intensity, to do more than tease.

Duncan laid his head back along Methos' shoulder, his breathing ragged, his eyes closed, his passion evidenced by the small groans of pleasure elicited by this move, or that. Methos was in no hurry, and he took his time until they were both flushed and trembling. Pressing forward, Methos guided Duncan to the wall, and taking each of his hands in turn, placed them against the wall, nudging his legs apart with his knee. He stood back, stroking his hand over Duncan's back and ass, slipping his fingers along the warm crevice.

"Stay there."

Moving to the bed, he found the lubricant and returned to Duncan's side, setting it on a table before continuing his caresses, this time letting one slippery finger slide more deeply, stroking it back and forth from perineum to anus, his other hand curving around to stroke and fondle Duncan's cock, the pressure firm but gentle. Duncan groaned and moved, seemingly unable to decide if he wanted to push forward or back.

"Don't move, Duncan. Just let yourself feel it."

"You're a teasing son-of-a-bitch, aren't you?" he said in a rusty voice.

"This shouldn't be news to you. Do you want me to stop?"

"God, no. If you stop, I'll kill you."

Methos laughed and kissed his shoulder, continuing to stroke and fondle, letting his fingers press more firmly, but not penetrating, until Duncan spread his legs wider, groaning, obviously finding restraining himself difficult. And still Methos continued, his own body hot and needy, his eyes consuming the passionate display before him. Beads of sweat rolled down Duncan's back, and Methos bent to catch them on his tongue, eliciting groans and murmurs. He thought of things he wanted to say, but he couldn't find the words and hoped his touch would convey how he felt.

Pulling his hands from Duncan's body, he reached for the bottle, noting idly that his own hands shook as he prepared himself, touching himself lightly, knowing he was close. He saw Duncan watching out of the corner of his eye and changed his motions, touching himself more firmly, pulling along his length, shuddering when Duncan pushed his hips back without seeming aware of his own movement.

He moved behind him, resuming his teasing stroke for a few moments, then pressing harder, holding on to Duncan's hip with the other hand, restraining any movement away -- but there was none. Duncan pushed back, taking him in, moving against his hand. Methos increased his motions, his own hunger pushing him, finding no reluctance, no resistance. He stood there, fucking Duncan with his fingers, listening to him, watching his hands try to find purchase on the wall. He was so caught up in the beauty of Duncan's passion that the single spoken word startled him.

"Please." It was low, and hoarse, and aching, and more than he deserved. It stripped him of what few defenses remained, threatening to leave him broken and scattered, and in that moment he realized just how deeply he _wanted_ to give himself over completely into Duncan's care, to lose himself in him. It felt so good to give himself up like this. He fought the urge to apologize, to beg to exist only in terms of what Duncan needed. To confess everything and hand over the few pieces of himself that remained. No terms...on either side.

Removing his hands, he stepped in behind Duncan, sliding his cock along the slickened skin, groaning when Duncan pressed back wantonly, reaching his hand back to grab Methos' hip to pull him in. Suddenly awkward, Methos guided his cock against Duncan, pressing gently, his other hand resting on the small of Duncan's back. They both groaned as he slid past the first ring of muscle, then Duncan shifted again and pushed his hips back, and Methos slid in deeply, floundering briefly until he grasped Duncan's hips, bracing himself, relying on the other man to support them. The heat and pressure were intense, and he pressed in hard, wanting more, wanting deeper, wanting to climb inside this desperately desired, passionately loved man.

He felt Duncan pulling away and briefly tried to stop him, not wanting to lose this feeling, but then he felt the movement, and it was even better. So he started moving, slowly and carefully, biting his lip at the intensity of it, willing himself to gentleness, not wanting to give any pain, any discomfort. When Duncan growled beneath him and started trying to speed things up, he laughed, his laughter interrupted by a broken gasp as Duncan flexed around him, urging him on. His control snapped, and he ceased worrying about Duncan's pleasure, his body driving him to take his own as he began to thrust, Duncan matching him move for move.

When he felt himself getting close, he wrapped his arm around Duncan's waist and reached with his other hand to stroke Duncan's cock, his movements strong and hard, counterpoint to his thrusting hips. Duncan stilled with a small, broken sound, then tightened around him as he climaxed, hips convulsively thrusting into Methos' hand.

It was that small thing that undid him, and he came.

* * *

They'd both been rather unsteady in the shower, but they'd managed to wash each other clean and dry off before stumbling to bed. He had almost dozed off, lying there, sated and at ease for the first time in what seemed months. The heavy arm lying across his stomach only added to his comfort.

"Will you stay?" The words were whispered across his shoulder.

"What?" Methos felt the tension returning already.

"Are you staying?" Mac's voice was stronger now, as if he hadn't really intended the first question to escape, but since it had, he had determined to follow it.

Methos felt a deep sadness that Duncan could still be so uncertain, but he knew he shouldn't be surprised -- and that Mac's uneasiness was perfectly understandable. There was no way that one romp, no matter how good, could mend all the hurts they'd inflicted on each other, intentionally and unintentionally. "What are you talking about?"

At first there was no response, then Mac rolled over on his back, one hand still against Methos' hip, as if he couldn't quite bring himself to not remain in contact. "Nothing. Let's just go to sleep."

Methos sat up and turned on the light. "I think that'll be a little difficult now, don't you?" He looked down at the other man, who was staring up at the ceiling. "Look at me, Duncan." Methos waited until he had his attention before expressing his own fear. "Did you let me do this just to keep me from leaving?"

"No! Of course not. I wanted it. I just--" He broke off and sat up, clasping his hands around his knees.

"You just what?" Methos almost smiled; there was something almost engaging in this uncertainty.

"It's just-- I still don't understand why you stay."

Methos fell back against the pillows, staring at Mac's broad back. //Lord, have I undermined his self-certainty this badly?// He remembered thinking that talking hadn't actually changed anything. He hadn't expected to be proven right quite so soon. "What do you mean, Duncan?" He kept his tone gentle.

"I...sometimes feel like I railroaded you into this, this...whatever it is we have."

"You don't think I'm old enough to make my own choices?"

"Did I give you a choice?" Mac was quiet for a moment. "I just wondered if you haven't thought better of it."

Methos raised one hand to stroke along Mac's back. "You have such a tremendously generous spirit, you know that? You're not perfect, by any means, but I stay because I want to. Because I want to be with you."

Mac was quiet for a long moment. "Things haven't been going very well for us, have they?"

"And you think that's all your fault?"

"Well, I'm the one who's been dragging you around hither and yon, not listening to you, not trying to understand you--"

"I've been doing my fair share of that, you know. I've not even been listening to myself very well."

"I'm the one who hasn't been giving you what you want." There was an extra note of pain.

"Which would be...?"

"Space, partnership...in bed, as well." Mac's voice trailed off.

"You've given me plenty of space, Duncan. Maybe too much," he said, acknowledging that most of his feeling of being smothered stemmed from his own irrational fear of getting too close, being too vulnerable. "And surely you don't really think I'd leave because you wouldn't let me fuck you?" Methos had to wrestle his anger back down, knowing it was a blanket for his own fear. "If so, you don't think very much of me."

"That's not what I meant--"

"Then perhaps you should tell me precisely what you did mean." Methos breathed deeply, knowing he had to see this through, not willing to let the secrets start all over again already. "Christ, Mac, if you don't enjoy it, we don't have to do it! You think I just stay for the sex? I can get that anywhere." He winced, thinking of the night before.

"It has nothing to do with that. It never did. That's not why. And I did enjoy it. God, did I enjoy it."

Methos smiled at that, running his hand along Mac's arm to his hand, pulling it back so he could rub his thumb along the wide palm. "Then why?"

"That first night, when I pulled back -- I'd forgotten about it, you know? Because it had nothing to do with you making love to me. That was just coincidence. I remember looking up and really _seeing_ you for the first time, how powerful you were, and it stunned me. I froze, and by the time I-- it was too late."

"So, you're saying that it wasn't about sex at all?"

"No, it was about me, about realizing how little I knew about you, how...small I feel sometimes, compared to you. For the first time, it hit me how..._real_ you are. How much of you there is. And that both frightened me...and attracted me. And after that...it's like it reminded me, but I never really thought about it, I just reacted. I didn't think about how it would seem to you."

Methos wasn't sure what to say. "It's okay, Duncan."

"No, it isn't. It hurt you; you thought I was rejecting you."

"Weren't you? Isn't that what you're saying? That who I am is too much for you?" Methos felt himself getting cold, in spite of Mac's earlier wantonness, his lack of reluctance. After all, it really wasn't about sex, and maybe nothing had changed. Maybe what Mac had felt just confirmed that he wasn't ready to handle this, to deal with Methos' and his unwieldy past. Just that quickly, Methos found himself back on the knife's edge -- but he kept hold of Mac's hand.

Mac ducked his head. "Maybe, but not often. There's so _much_ of you. It scares me, sometimes. Intimidates me. You say you're 'just a guy,' but you're so much more than that, too." He paused. "But I want to find out who you are, not just who you let me see because you think I can't handle it. You shouldn't have to pay the price for my insecurity."

"Is it insecurity, Mac? Or do you just have a hard time letting someone else be the strong one, like I said?"

"Isn't that the same thing?"

"Maybe. But maybe a part of you wants that, wants to let go of the burden of being the one in control. You're too used to being the stronger one. The one in charge."

Mac grinned. "You never met Tessa."

"You know what I mean."

"Yeah, I do. I shouldn't--" Mac broke off as Methos laughed, and turned to look over his shoulder at him. "What's so funny?"

Methos sat up and kissed one strong shoulder. "You are. Not everything is your fault, you know. It's as much my fault for letting you get away with it, for not talking to you. It was easier to hold back, not to have to deal with whether you could handle it or not. So, let me have my own flaws and faults. I've certainly earned them." He cocked his head. "You do know I have faults, right?" He pulled back until Mac was lying against the pillows, then bent over him with one hand on his chest, looking down into his eyes.

"A few." Mac smiled slightly.

"You're too prone to martyrdom, Duncan. And you're too over-protective. I'm not Tessa. I'm not even Amanda. I've been taking care of myself for a very long time."

"Oh, like I'm the only martyr in this crowd." Duncan rolled his eyes, then looked serious. "Maybe that's part of it, though. Maybe it feels like you don't need me."

"You mean, if I can take care of myself, what do I need you for?"

"Yeah." Mac's voice was rough, and he looked down, but he lifted his own hand to cover Methos' hand where it lay on Mac's chest.

"What do you need me for?"

Mac lifted his head and met his eyes again, his puzzlement evident. "What do you mean?"

"Just what I said: what do you need me for?"

"For friendship, companionship-"

"You don't think I need those things, too?" He heard the wistful note in his voice and smiled at the look on Mac's face. "I don't need you to be anything for me, to do anything for me. I just want to be with you. I want to be your friend, your lover -- part of your life."

"You are, all that and more. But sometimes I need to be needed."

"I-- I have trouble with that. _Because_ I've survived so long on my own. But I can try. Sometimes...sometimes I even want it."

Mac smiled at him. "That was hard, wasn't it?"

Methos nodded, watching his hand trail down Mac's belly, curving along the edge of the sheet. "Yeah, it was. It's...hard for me to admit that maybe part of me likes letting you be in charge, likes just following you around. But I want a shared life. Something we make together, for however long it lasts."

"You don't think we'll last?"

"I think that life has no guarantees, even for Immortals. But I don't want you holding back from me because you're afraid I'm going to take off without warning. I'm not like that, Mac."

"You left after Seireadan. Seven months."

Methos nodded, acknowledging the truth. "Yes."

"Will you do it again?"

"I...I don't know." His honesty cut deep.

"Methos, did it ever occur you to maybe try and let us handle things together? That leaving won't protect me from anything? Besides, you'll just miss me again."

Methos smiled at the reminder of what he'd said when he'd finally showed up on Mac's doorstep, seven months after walking out on him in Seacouver. "Do you remember the first time we met?"

"Vividly."

He looked up and met Mac's eyes, loving the impudent grin on his face. "Okay, stupid question. You walked in, knowing there was another Immortal, no hesitation. And you _knew who I was_. There was no doubt in your mind, was there?"

"No. It made sense."

"Did it? I could have been some random Immortal, hiding out in the Watchers, spending my time diligently tracking down the oldest of us so I could take his head."

"I suppose you still could be."

Methos cuffed him lightly, and Mac grinned wider. "Right, the first lie I tell you is to confirm that I'm the world's supposedly oldest living Immortal. You might have noticed that pretending to be me isn't the world's healthiest occupation."

"Neither is _being_ you. Yet, you trusted me. Why did you trust me?"

"I have no idea. Not really. Partly I trusted Joe, and I trusted what I knew of you. And I knew that you were a protective bastard, not a head-hunter. After all, what's one of the first things you did?"

"Drank your awful beer?"

"You tried to protect me. You bought into my outward appearance, and you decided to set yourself up as my protector."

"I had ulterior motives."

Methos slid his hand along Mac's hip and smiled when he squirmed. "That's a nice thought. But do you remember what I answered then?"

Mac intoned, "'You cannot fight my battles for me, MacLeod.'"

"Something like that. It's still true. But it was a very charming offer. We can't fight each other's battles, Mac."

"Do you remember what I told you about Seireadan?"

Methos squeezed his hip, flashing on that moment from his dream, catching Mac's sword, feeling the panic of having someone that trusted him that much, to give himself over so willingly. "Yeah."

"It's still true, Methos. I'm still willing to hold your coat while you fight."

"And what if I choose not to fight? Will you follow me then?"

Mac reached a hand up and stroked his cheek, bringing their eyes together again. "I can try. If you'll try to stop thinking of them as 'my' problems and 'your' problems, and give us a chance to consider them 'our' problems."

"We're Immortals, Duncan. We can live past some problems. We don't always have to rush in and solve them all."

"That's not me, Methos."

"But sometimes it's me, and if there's going to be any kind of 'us,' you have to let me deal with some problems my own way. This is always going to be a struggle for us, Mac, how we deal with things."

"This is part of who you are."

"Yes."

"And if I want to learn who you are, I have to also to respect who you are."

"Yes." Methos resumed stroking his hand along Mac's stomach.

"Then you have to learn to stop protecting _me_. I'm a big boy, I can handle whatever you throw at me -- as long as you're honest with me."

"Honesty is not always a survival trait, Mac."

"No, it isn't. Neither is trying to fix everything by yourself, whether by leaving it behind, or trying to wait for it to be over."

"You're saying you want a compromise."

"I think we can manage it. We're both adults, more or less."

"Maybe we can take turns. This week's problem, we use my solution, next week, it's your turn." Methos slid his hand until it rested over the larger, squarer hand on Mac's belly.

"Maybe we can take it one problem at a time."

Judging that their serious talk was running down, Methos smiled. "In that case, we have a problem."

"Yes?"

Methos slid his hand down to where Mac's cock was beginning to stir. "I think it's my turn to problem solve."

"I see." Mac grinned. "Tell me the truth, you really are only in this for the sex, aren't you?"

Methos smiled slightly, cupping his hand over the heated length. "Mmm-hmmm. So you'd better keep me happy, don't you think?"

The pause was just a moment too long. "I'll try."

Methos bent and gave him a swift kiss, followed by a sharp bite to his lower lip. He pulled back and watched Mac's tongue slide out to soothe his lip. "You can't make me happy, Duncan. It doesn't work that way, you know that."

"All I know is that I'm happier with you, than without you."

"Always?" He could see Mac struggling to give an honest answer.

"Mostly."

"I can't change who I am."

Mac looked up. "Don't be ridiculous. Of course you can. You have. The question is why you think you have to in this case. Or maybe why you think you haven't."

Methos blinked at him. "I--" He shut his mouth again, and Mac grinned.

"About that problem." His eyes gleamed devilishly at Methos as he tried to slide the sheet back, pushing his hips up into Methos' obstructing hand.

Methos stroked Mac's hair out of his eyes. "Do you have plans tomorrow?"

Mac stopped, looking startled at the interruption. "Beyond helping out Joe? Not really. You have something in mind?" He gasped as Methos bent his head, lipping the outline of Mac's erection through the sheet.

"Mmmm...There's an old friend of mine -- and Elinore's." He looked to see Mac's reaction, but he seemed distracted. "I ran into him yesterday. I think you'd like him. Kinda strange."

Mac groaned slightly as Methos exhaled, heating the cloth and the flesh beneath. "One of us?" he asked breathlessly, unmindful of the ridiculousness of his question.

Methos nodded, amused by the slight whimper the motion elicited as he rubbed his lips and nose back and forth. Then he ran his teeth lightly up and down, causing Mac to flex his fingers in the bed-sheet.

"Yes."

"Jerry Thomas?" Mac's voice was hoarse, as if it was considering a temporary vacation.

For long moments there was silence as Methos continued to tease him through the sheet, bending to heat the cloth over his balls, tonguing it until was damp. Then Methos pulled back and nodded, blowing on the cooling cloth, watching Mac's reactions. "You know him?"

"Mmmmm." Mac shook his head in disbelief. "It's such a small world."

Methos idly stroked Mac's leg, lost in thought until Mac cuffed him gently on the head. Methos squeezed his thigh and smiled, bending down for a long kiss.

"I bet he's got some stories to tell about you."

"I'll worry about that tomorrow."

"Good, because right now, our problem is reaching crisis proportions, and I want to know what you're going to do about it."

"_Our_ problem?"

"Hey, my problem is your problem, right?"

Grinning, Methos pulled back the sheet and set to problem-solving with a will.

He took Mac's cock into his mouth, lost in a surge of lust and love so inextricably intertwined he couldn't have sorted them out if he'd wanted, and he no longer wanted to. He felt Mac's hands slide down to twine into his hair, to hold him, guide him, and Methos let him. Rapidly losing himself in the press of those hands, the smell and taste of the body beneath him, he felt once more that odd feeling of not knowing where he ended, and where Mac began.

It no longer seemed such a problem.

* * *

Finis

 

_Historical Notes: The Great Fire of 1875 is factual. It destroyed a half-mile square section directly in the heart of town, causing a then-estimated $10 million dollars in damage. Miraculously, though well over 2000 people were left homeless, only three people are reported to have died: two men killed by falling rubble and a young girl, Mary Jane Simpson. A memorial to her stands at the entrance to the Virginia City Cemeteries. Reconstruction was begun in 1876, and many of those buildings still stand today._

_Professor Jerry Thomas was an actual historical figure long before his fictionalization as an Immortal. He was the original head bartender at the Delta Saloon in 1863 and eventually went on to tend bar in San Francisco._

_The Comstock Lode in Virginia City, Nevada, was one of the richest ore deposits on earth, eventually producing more than $400 million dollars in gold and silver ore and shaping the history of the American West. There is no way to include complete information on the rich history of this era and its participants here._

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](mailto:taselby@tenebris.org) [](http://www.tenebris.org/chaos/index.html)

 


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